Turkish academics visit IFIMES

PRESS RELEASE

Turkish academics visit IFIMES

LJUBLJANA, 1 December 2014 – Directors of the International Institute for Middle-East and Balkan Studies (IFIMES) Bakhatyar Aljaf and Zijad Bećirović today received a group of eminent Turkish professors and researches who participate in the “Islam in Balkans” project: Professor Muhammet Savaş Kafkasyalı, Professor Bahadır Gücüyeter, Fatih Yeyiş and Hasan Bekdeş.

The project is conducted in cooperation with the Office of the Prime Minister of the Republic of Turkey, Turkish Cooperation and Coordination Agency and Yunus Emre Institute. A scientific publication and a film will be prepared at the end of the project, for which numerous scholars will prepare analyses and researches on the following topics:

• conceptual and theoretical issues regarding the Balkans and Islam,
• issues related to the islamization of the Balkans through history,
• issues related to the Islamic period in the Balkans,
• issues related to the fall of the Ottoman Empire and the situation in the Balkans during that period,      
• issues related to the dissolution of the Soviet Union, end of the Cold War and the restructuring process in the Balkans.

In the framework of the project Turkish academics have already visited Montenegro, Albania, Macedonia, Kosovo, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia and Croatia. During their visit to Slovenia they invited the IFIMES International Institute to participate in the project. IFIMES will therefore provide its experts to contribute to the project, while Director Bećirović will cooperate as a member of the project's Advisory Board.

At the end of the visit IFIMES Directors presented the esteemed guests with the Institute's latest publications.

Ljubljana, 1 December 2014