The traditional Harvest Festival held in Fürth, Germany every year will be held without Ottoman flags and the Mehter March this year. The municipality announced that they are determined in the ban against Ottoman symbols.
For 200 years, a giant Harvest Festival has been held every year in Fürth, Bavaria in Germany in the first week of October. Fürth allows foreign groups to march in the parade to show that they are a city open to world cultures.
AKP’s Germany branch Religious Affairs Turkish-Islamic Union (DİTİB) and Turkish nationalist associations had been participating in the parade with a Mehter band carrying Ottoman flags for the last 4 years. But the city municipality in charge of the Harvest Festival parade announced in January when the program was being prepared that they would not allow the Ottoman flags in the parade.
MUNICIPALITY DETERMINED FOR THE BAN
The Fürth Municipality has processed the appeals by Turkish associations and made a statement that they do not want to see Ottoman symbolism, showing their determination in following through with the ban. The statement pointed out that the Ottoman flags with 3 crescents signify a call to war.
Some local administrations and municipalities in Austria had banned hanging visible Ottoman flags.
