INSTITUTE OF TURKISH STUDIES September 27, 2015 Ambassador Serdar Kilig Embassy of the Republic of Turkey 2525 Massachusetts Ave., NW Washington, DC 20008 ‘Dear Mr. Ambassador: 1 am writing to express my disappointment and the dismay of our colleagues on the Institute of Turkish Studies Board of Governors over the reported decision to terminate the trust fund arrangement that has supported the work of ITS on behalf of American scholarship on Turkey and, by this means, the appreciation of Turkey in the United States. For over thirty years, ITS has been the principal independent supporter and sponsor of Turkish studies in the United States. ‘The research, publishing, and teaching of several generations of scholars, now the leading lights of American academe on matters Turkish and Ottoman, have been supported — indeed, made possible — by this funding, for which they and the Board are grateful. ITS beneficiaries have touched thousands of others, making friends for your country across a broad front, and they have helped to foster and then further the tremendous increase in American public interest in Turkey that has developed over the last 10-20 years — exactly the purpose for which ITS was created by our predecessors. As official relations between our countries have ebbed and flowed, the work of these scholars has helped ensure an enduring fabric above the occasional difficulties in government-to-government channels. That work has also ensured that US media and American public officials have access to well-informed and diverse views about Turkish politics, foreign policy and security concerns, history, economics, society, culture, arts and the like, as well as the full range of issues in US-Turkish relations. Obviously, the Turkish government has every right to decide how to deploy its financial resources. It seems important to us that the authorities in Ankara decided decades ago, at a time of rather significant economic and financial difficulty, that investing through an enduring trust ‘mechanism to support the establishment and activities of an independent and credible ITS was worth it. They were right. Turkey has received a huge retum on its investment. It also seems important that the government, through its actions when the original term of the trust ran out, ‘moved not to terminate it, but to keep it going, establishing a precedent that is worth continuing. Whatever may be the intention now in considering an end to the trust arrangement, it will almost certainly be interpreted widely in ways unhelpful to Turkey, injurious to the personal and other relationships that you and I have cared about, and detrimental to the kind of support and sympathy your country and government get here. Intercultural Center + Box 571033 + Geongetown University + Washington, D.C, 20057-1033 ‘Telephone: (212) 687-0292. » Fax: 202) 687-3780 + www.surkishst E-mail itsdirector@¢turkishstudies.org2 need also to express my surprise, and the astonishment of all the other Board members, with whom I have been in touch, that you, as a member of the ITS Board and its Honorary Chairman, did not see fit directly to discuss this matter with me or the Board, but instead acted through the embassy’s lawyers, Saltzman and Evinch. This was a great professional discourtesy to me, as a friend and colleague, and to the Board, whose members include America’s seniot-most scholars on Turkey and others who are among the most knowledgeable and best friends your country and US-Turkish relations have here. On behalf of my colleagues, I urge continuation of the trust arrangement so as to enable ITS to continue its work as an independent force to promote Turkish studies in the years to come. If there is to be a formal decision by the Turkish government to terminate trust support of ITS, we request written notification to that effect from an appropriate official and disbursement of the undistributed trust earnings would normally be transferred to ITS in the October-November time frame (in the past, circa $200,000) toward enabling ITS to meet it current and outstanding obligations. Respectfully, Jk, Ambassador Ross Wilson Chairman, Board of Governors