Turkey's Erdogan offers seminary exchange for Greek mosque minarets

Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras said he hoped to reopen the school on his next visit to Turkey

ISTANBUL, TURKEY - FEBRUARY 06: Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras lights a candle as he visits the Theological School of Halki in Heybeliada Island on February 06, 2019 in Istanbul, Turkey. Tsipras is the first serving Greek prime minister to visit the Halki seminary on the island in 90 years. Halki seminary produced both lay and religious leaders, including Patriarch Bartholomew, before Turkey shut it down in 1971. (Photo by Burak Kara/Getty Images)
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Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Saturday suggested a mosque in Athens should open with minarets if the Greek premier wants to reopen a seminary in Istanbul, as a dispute over the two landmarks ramps up between the neighbours.

Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras was in Turkey this month and visited the disputed landmarks of Hagia Sophia and the now-closed Greek Orthodox Halki seminary.

Mr Tsipras said during the visit to the seminary located on Heybeli island off Istanbul on February 6 that he hoped to reopen the school next time with Mr Erdogan.

Future priests of the Constantinople diocese had been trained at the seminary, which was closed in 1971 after tensions between Ankara and Athens over Cyprus.

Mr Erdogan on Saturday complained that the Fethiye Mosque in Athens had no minarets despite Greek insistence that it would open.

The mosque was built in 1458 during the Ottoman occupation of Greece but has not been used as a mosque since 1821.

"Look you want something from us, you want the Halki seminary. And I tell you (Greece), come, let's open the Fethiye Mosque," Mr Erdogan said during a rally in the northwestern province of Edirne ahead of local elections on March 31.

"They said, 'we are opening the mosque' but I said, why isn't there a minaret? Can a church be a church without a bell tower?" he said, describing his talks with Mr Tsipras.

"We say, you want to build a bell tower? Come and do it... But what is an essential part of our mosques? The minarets," the Turkish president added.

Mr Erdogan said Mr Tsipras told him he was wary of criticism from the Greek opposition.

After the independence war against Ottomans began in 1821, the minaret is believed by some to have been destroyed because it was a symbol of the Ottoman occupation.

Ankara had returned land taken from the seminary in 1943 but there is still international pressure on Turkey to reopen it.

Mr Erdogan has previously said that its reopening is dependent on reciprocal steps from Greece to enhance the rights of the Turkish minority.

The seminary is located on an island in the Marmara Sea, near the coast of Istanbul, Turkey’s largest city. It was once one of the most important centres of Greek Orthodoxy but a Turkish ban on private education forced it to shut. Turkey has continuously refused to reopen the site in the face of international criticism. But Mr Tsipras' visit to Turkey has given hope to the idea of the seminary being open once again.