Conclusions

The era after the population exchange of 1923 was marked by a drastic decrease of the Muslim population in Greece and the minoritisation of the Muslims of Thrace (and after 1947 of the Muslims of the Dodecanese islands).

For long the Greek law did not provide for the application of Shari^ta law by civil courts. Often, the Court of Cassation was introducing exemptions to the universal applicability of the Civil Code based on a segregation of ‘Greek’ and ‘Muslim’ law. Citizens are seen as belonging to closed communities, sub­ject to different legal orders. Human rights standards are bent according to religious affiliation. This situation amounted to an imposed division between Greek citizens on religious grounds, contradicting the Constitution and the Convention under the scope of discrimination on the ground of religious iden­tity (echr, Art. 14). Yet Islam is still perceived as incompatible with the pre­vailing Christian/Greek identity, which makes it difficult for Muslims to fully enjoy Greek citizenship. Although the new regulations will settle several issues of incompatibility with fundamental human rights principles, the Greek gov­ernments seem to suffer from inertia, as they remain reluctant to acknowledge and incorporate the transformations which in the near future, if not today, will characterise Greek Islam.