Hrant Dink Foundation Conference on Kayseri Banned in İstanbul As Well

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The conference on "Social, Cultural and Economic History of Kayseri and the Region" to take place at the Hrant Dink Foundation's hall in Şişli, İstanbul on October 18-19 has been banned by the Şişli District Governorship.

The conference was initially planned to take place in Kayseri; however, it was banned by the Kayseri Governorship. In response to this ban, the Board of Directors of the Foundation decided to hold the conference in İstanbul.

'All preparations were made"

Releasing a statement about the issue, on its website, Hrant Dink Foundation has stated the following:

"The conference on 'Social, Cultural and Economic History of Kayseri and the Region', to take place at the Hrant Dink Foundation's Havak Hall on October 18-19, has been banned!

"As has been closely followed by the public, the conference had been initially planned to take place in Kayseri, yet was banned due to the interference of the Kayseri Governorship. Upon this development, the Board of the Directors of our Foundation decided to hold the conference in Istanbul.

"At a time when all the preparations have been made, all speakers from Turkey and all around the world have already arrived in Istanbul for the conference to take place tomorrow; today on October 17th, Thursday at 17:08, an official notice of ban was given by the Sisli District Governorship to the Foundation, which does not mention any justification for the ban decision.

"We regret to announce that the conference on 'Social, Cultural and Economic History of Kayseri and the Region', which was supposed to take place in light of the valuable scientific contributions by numerous scholars from Turkey and abroad, has been banned."

About the conference

The conference on Kayseri was planned to be held as part of an international conference series contributing to a detailed understanding of the changing social, economic, politic and cultural structure of various cities of Turkey during the 19th and 20th century. In the past years, the conference series were organized on Adana, Diyarbakır, Mardin, Van and Izmir.

The aim of this year's conference was to highlight the multicultural and rich history of Kayseri and to share research and publication on the cultural heritage of Kayseri prepared in 2016.

The international scientific committee of the conference has selected the papers of 27 scientists from various cities of Turkey as well as from America, France, Greece and Armenia and invited them to Kayseri to present their research. Moreover, a cultural heritage tour of Kayseri was planned to take place after the conference for the conference participants to witness the history of Kayseri first hand. (TP/SD)