[Congressional Bills 113th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H.R. 4347 Introduced in House (IH)]

113th CONGRESS
  2d Session
                                H. R. 4347

   To require the Secretary of State to provide an annual report to 
   Congress regarding United States Government efforts to survey and 
secure the return, protection, and restoration of stolen, confiscated, 
or otherwise unreturned Christian properties in the Republic of Turkey 
   and in those areas currently occupied by the Turkish military in 
                            northern Cyprus.


_______________________________________________________________________


                    IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                             March 28, 2014

 Mr. Royce (for himself and Mr. Engel) introduced the following bill; 
         which was referred to the Committee on Foreign Affairs

_______________________________________________________________________

                                 A BILL


 
   To require the Secretary of State to provide an annual report to 
   Congress regarding United States Government efforts to survey and 
secure the return, protection, and restoration of stolen, confiscated, 
or otherwise unreturned Christian properties in the Republic of Turkey 
   and in those areas currently occupied by the Turkish military in 
                            northern Cyprus.

    Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the 
United States of America in Congress assembled,

SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

    This Act may be cited as the ``Turkey Christian Churches 
Accountability Act''.

SEC. 2. FINDINGS.

    Congress finds the following:
            (1) United States diplomatic leadership contributes 
        meaningfully and materially to the protection internationally 
        of religious minorities and their faith-based practices and 
        places of worship.
            (2) The International Religious Freedom Act of 1998 states 
        that ``It shall be the policy of the United States to condemn 
        violations of religious freedom, and to promote, and to assist 
        other governments in the promotion of, the fundamental right to 
        freedom of religion.''.
            (3) The House of Representatives, when it adopted House 
        Resolution 306 on December 13, 2011, called on the Secretary of 
        State, in all official contacts with Turkish leaders, to urge 
        Turkey to ``allow the rightful church and lay owners of 
        Christian church properties, without hindrance or restriction, 
        to organize and administer prayer services, religious 
        education, clerical training, appointments, and succession'', 
        and to ``return to their rightful owners all Christian churches 
        and other places of worship, monasteries, schools, hospitals, 
        monuments, relics, holy sites, and other religious properties, 
        including movable properties, such as artwork, manuscripts, 
        vestments, vessels, and other artifacts''.
            (4) On September 28, 2010, the House of Representatives 
        adopted House Resolution 1631, calling for the protection of 
        religious sites and artifacts, as well as for general respect 
        for religious freedom in Turkish-occupied areas of northern 
        Cyprus.
            (5) Christian churches and communities in the Republic of 
        Turkey and in the occupied areas of Cyprus continue to be 
        prevented from fully practicing their faith and face serious 
        obstacles to reestablishing full legal, administrative, and 
        operational control over stolen, expropriated, confiscated, or 
        otherwise unreturned churches and other religious properties 
        and sites.
            (6) In many cases the rightful Christian church 
        authorities, including relevant Holy Sees located outside 
        Turkey and Turkish-occupied territories, are obstructed from 
        safeguarding, repairing, or otherwise caring for their holy 
        sites upon their ancient homelands, because the properties have 
        been destroyed, expropriated, converted into mosques, storage 
        facilities, or museums, or subjected to deliberate neglect.
            (7) While the Turkish Government has made efforts in recent 
        years to address these issues and to return some church 
        properties, much more must be done to rectify the situation of 
        Christian communities in these areas, as a vast majority of 
        Christian holy sites continue to be held by the Turkish 
        Government or by third parties.
            (8) On April 24, 2013, Catholicos Karekin II and Catholicos 
        Aram I, spiritual leaders of the millions of Christian Armenian 
        faithful in Armenia and the Diaspora, noted that Turkey 
        continued to unjustly ``[retain] confiscated church estates and 
        properties, and religious and cultural treasures of the 
        Armenian people'', and called on Turkey ``[t]o immediately 
        return the Armenian churches, monasteries, church properties, 
        and spiritual and cultural treasures, to the Armenian people as 
        their rightful owner''.
            (9) The boundaries of Turkey encompass significant historic 
        Christian lands, including the biblical lands of Armenia 
        (present-day Anatolia), home to many of early Christianity's 
        pivotal events and holy sites, such as Mount Ararat, the 
        location cited in the Bible as the landing place of Noah's Ark.
            (10) These ancient territories were for thousands of years 
        home to a large, indigenous Christian population, but, because 
        of years of repressive Turkish Government policies, historic 
        atrocities, and brutal persecution, today Christians constitute 
        less than one percent of Turkey's population.
            (11) As a result of the Turkish Government's invasion of 
        the northern area of the Republic of Cyprus on July 20, 1974, 
        and the Turkish military's continued illegal and discriminatory 
        occupation of portions of this sovereign state, the future and 
        very existence of Greek Cypriot, Maronite, and Armenian 
        communities are now in grave jeopardy.
            (12) Under the Turkish occupation of northern Cyprus, 
        freedom of worship has been severely restricted, access to 
        religious sites blocked, religious sites systematically 
        destroyed, and a large number of religious and archaeological 
        objects illegally confiscated or stolen.
            (13) The United States Commission on International 
        Religious Freedom, in its 2012 annual report, criticized ``the 
        Turkish government's systematic and egregious limitations on 
        the freedom of religion'', and warned that ``[l]ongstanding 
        policies continue to threaten the survivability and viability 
        of minority religious communities in Turkey''.
            (14) Christian minorities in Turkey continue to face 
        discrimination, prohibitions on the training and succession of 
        clergy, and violent attacks, which have at times resulted in 
        lenient sentencing, including the reduced sentence for the 
        murderer of the Catholic Church's head bishop in Turkey, Luigi 
        Padovese, in June 2010, or delayed justice, including the 
        unresolved torture and murder, in April 2007, of three 
        employees of a Protestant Bible publishing house in Malatya, 
        Turkey.
            (15) The Government of Turkey, in contravention of its 
        international legal obligations, refuses to recognize the 
        2,000-year-old Sacred See of the Ecumenical Patriarchate's 
        international status, has confiscated the large majority of the 
        assets and properties of the Ecumenical Patriarchate, Greek 
        cultural and educational foundations, maintains that candidates 
        for the position of Ecumenical Patriarch must be Turkish 
        citizens, and continues to refuse to reopen the Theological 
        School at Halki, thus impeding training and succession for the 
        Greek Orthodox clergy in Turkey.
            (16) The Government of Turkey, in contravention of its 
        international legal obligations, continues to place substantial 
        restrictions and other limitations upon the Armenian 
        Patriarchate's right to train and educate clergy and select and 
        install successors without government interference.
            (17) Religious freedom is an essential cornerstone of 
        democracy that promotes respect for individual liberty, which 
        contributes to greater stability, and is therefore a priority 
        value for the United States to promote in its engagement with 
        other countries.

SEC. 3. REPORT REQUIREMENTS.

    (a) In General.--Not later than 180 days after the date of the 
enactment of this Act and annually thereafter until 2021, the Secretary 
of State shall submit to the Committee on Foreign Affairs of the House 
of Representatives and the Committee on Foreign Relations of the Senate 
a report on the status and return of stolen, confiscated, or otherwise 
unreturned Christian churches, places of worship, and other properties 
in or from the Republic of Turkey and in the areas of northern Cyprus 
occupied by the Turkish military that shall contain the following:
            (1) A comprehensive listing of all the Christian churches, 
        places of worship, and other properties, such as monasteries, 
        schools, hospitals, monuments, relics, holy sites, and other 
        religious properties, including movable properties, such as 
        artwork, manuscripts, vestments, vessels, and other artifacts, 
        in or from Turkey and in the territories of the Republic of 
        Cyprus under military occupation by Turkey that are claimed as 
        stolen, confiscated, or otherwise wrongfully removed from the 
        ownership of their rightful Christian church owners.
            (2) Description of all engagement over the previous year on 
        this issue by officials of the Department of State with 
        representatives of the Republic of Turkey regarding the return 
        to their rightful owners of all Christian churches, places of 
        worship, and other properties, such as monasteries, schools, 
        hospitals, monuments, relics, holy sites, and other religious 
        properties, including movable properties, such as artwork, 
        manuscripts, vestments, vessels, and other artifacts, both 
        those located within Turkey's borders and those under control 
        of Turkish military forces in the occupied northern areas of 
        Cyprus.
    (b) Inclusion in Annual Country Reports on Human Rights Practices 
and International Religious Freedom Report.--The information required 
under subsection (a) shall be summarized in the annual Country Reports 
on Human Rights Practices and International Religious Freedom Reports.
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