U.N. Human Rights Ninth session of the Forum on Minority Issues on "Minorities in situations of humanitarian crises” Contribution of Ecumenical Federation of Constantinopolitans Prolonged Minority Human Rights Violations Creates Fragility to Future Crisis Conditions: The Case of the Expatriated Greek Community of Istanbul The effects of prolonged human rights violations against minority communities results into not only trans-generation trauma but also conditions of fragility of these communities in case of economic and social crisis even many decades later. The damage caused to a minority community, destroys the social fabric and structure of it and makes it vulnerable to future crisis conditions when they appear. The case of the Greek-Orthodox Minority of Istanbul is a case in point. This Minority although being under the International Protection of the Lausanne Treaty and despite the fact the Republic of Turkey was among the first countries to endorse the European Human Rights Conventions in Rome(1954), it has been a victim of long term anti-minority policies throughout the period 1923-2003. The most severe violations towards the Greek-Orthodox minority of Istanbul were: (a) the mobilization to work battalions of minority males aged 18-45 in 1941 under terrible conditions, (b) the “welfare tax” of 1942-44 aiming at the economic destruction of minorities, (c) the massive scale Pogrom of the 6-7 September 1955 in Istanbul, one of the most severe massive scale violence in post War Europe, (d) the forced deportation of members of the Greek Community of Istanbul holding the “Etablis” status according to Lausanne Treaty. Furthermore, the anti-minority state measures were strengthened after the Coup de Etad of 1960 by the establishment of the “Special Minority Commission (Azinliklar Taali Komisyonu)” with superseding powers of all executive, legislative and judicial authorities and whose members were primarily selected from the state security services until 2004. It is important to emphasize the fact that these anti-minority measures were also serious violations of the Constitution of the Republic of Turkey and are