Kemal Ergun, the head of Germany-based NGO Islamic Community Milli Gorus which oversees 450 mosques through out Germany rejected allegations that the German state has condoned the growth his organization on a rare Turkish national TV appearance. The accusation have been made by the controversial Turkish preacher known as Cuppeli Ahmet.
Ergun on Wednesday night attended a popular debate show on CNN’s Turkish affiliation to defy the “baseless” accusations. Cuppeli Ahmet claimed during the show that the German state “allowed” Islamic Community Milli Gorus to grow. “Without the state go ahead, it’s would not be possible to open and operate so many mosques and carry out all other activities in Germany,” Cuppeli Ahmet whose full name is Ahmet Mahmut Unlu claimed.
Ergun joined the debate via phone to refute the claims of Unlu saying his organization’s foremost peculiarity is being civil, having no affiliation to neither the German nor the Turkish state. “We never received any financial support from German, Turkish or another state,” Ergun reiterated.
Turkish-Muslim NGOs including Milli Gorus have been on a close watch of German intelligence agency Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution or BfV for years. German domestic intelligence was recently given a green light on reviewing Turkish Islamic Union of Diyanet or DITIB, the largest Muslim NGO with close ties to Turkish state. Germany accused DITIB which runs nearly 900 mosques through out Germany for espionage but charges were later dropped due to lack of evidence. However, German media prefers to keep repeating the baseless accusations in every news about DITIB as if the they were proven before a German court.
Kemal Ergun reminded during the debate that although DITIB has been feeling the pressure from the German state, Germany’s intelligence has been reviewing Milli Gorus for over 20 years.
Estimated 20 thousand members of Gulen cult have fled to Germany following the bloody coup attempt in 2016. Germany have embraced the Gulen members with open arms allocating vast amount of public taxes to provide for them despite the NATO ally Turkey allocating Gulen cult a terror group and the perpetrator of the coup attempt.
Diaspora Daily 