Tilmann Geske was killed in 2007 in a violent crime in a Christian bookstore, but her family stayed in Turkey. Now the state will not renew the residence permit of his 31-year-old daughter.
Michal Canina Geske, in the foreground in 2007, at the funeral for the murder of his father. / Instagram.
Michal Canina Geske, the daughter of a German Christian worker murdered in a brutal 2007 attack in eastern Turkey, may be forced to leave the country after nearly three decades of residence, German broadcaster Deutsche Welle Turkish service reported.
Geske, 31, was three years old when she moved to Turkey with her family. On 18 April 2007, her father, Tilmann Ekkehart Geske, was one of three Christians killed at the Zirve Publishing House in Malatya.
The group were tied up, tortured, and had their throats cut. The other two victims, Necati Aydın and Uğur Yüksel, were of Turkish nationality.
The murders sparked fear among Turkey’s Christian minorities and raised concerns about the growing nationalism and hostility towards non-Muslims in a predominantly Muslim country that was seeking EU membership.
Despite the attack, the Geske family chose to stay in Turkey.
Michal Geske studied at a university in Ankara, where she later worked as a teacher at a private school. She had held various residence permits, including a work permit and a student visa.
After taking unpaid leave to complete her PhD, she applied for a new student visa. According to DW, she was told her residency would not be extended.
Geske, who is preparing to defend her dissertation at Middle East Technical University (ODTÜ) in September, has filed a lawsuit with the Ankara Administrative Court through her lawyer, Orhan Kemal Cengiz.
She claims that the decision is illegal and disproportionate, and requests a stay and an annulment.
“Of course, losing a father is difficult for anyone, under any circumstances, but there are bad people everywhere. This terrible thing happened in Turkey, but as a family, we never blamed Turkey as a whole. We wouldn’t be here if we didn’t love the Turkish people”, she told DW.
She said that her decision to return to Turkey after living in Germany for a year following high school was “deliberate”.
“I love Turkey. I love living here. Financial standards are higher in Germany, but life is not just about that. My family and community are here”, added Geske.
“Anyone else would have left the country immediately and worked against it, but that’s not what happened here. On the contrary, these people did everything they could to stay and have fought hard to remain ever since”, pointed out Cengiz, who also defended victims in the Zirve trial.
He added that, rather than being removed, Michal should be protected and welcomed by the state and society.
Following the diplomatic crisis over the detention of US pastor Andrew Brunson in 2016, Turkey began to quietly deny residence permits to foreign Protestant pastors and Christian workers.
Although Brunson was released in 2018 under pressure from the US, Cengiz believes that the Turkish authorities continued to target Christian religious workers.
Around 200 foreign Protestants and their families, approximately 500–600 people in total, have reportedly been forced to leave, often labelled as “national security threats”.
Cengiz underlines that, although the official justification for these deportations is often “engaging in activities against national security”, court documents and legal defenses in constitutional appeals reveal that the real reason is missionary work.
Since the closure of the Halki Seminary in 1971, Christian communities in Turkey have had no institutions to train pastors, yet attempts to bring in foreign religious workers are often blocked.
Despite constitutional and international guarantees on religious freedom, Cengiz claims that the government is pursuing a policy to reduce the presence of Christian leaders, especially Protestants, under administrative and bureaucratic pretexts.
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