01/07/2005 (Agence Europe) - Twelve years ago, 37 Turkish intellectuals lost their lives in a hotel in Sivas, burnt alive by Islamic fundamentalists. Today, in Turkey, a number of associations are fighting for the memory of this event to live on. At the initiative of the president of the delegation for Turkey at the European Parliament, Cem Özdemir (Greens/EFA, Germany), a delegation representing these associations stopped at the European Parliament on 30 June to state their demands, such as the construction of a museum at the place where the former Madimak Hotel used to stand, ”rather than a fast-food outlet as there is today, which puts Turkey to shame”. The official recognition of the massacre by the Turkish authorities would be one step towards the “democratic, secular and European Turkey” that we want, explained Turgut Öker, one of the leaders of the Alevi community (a progressist Muslim-influenced movement) in Europe.