The Scientific and Technical Research Council of Turkey (TÜBİTAK) has put a stop to the publication and sale of all books in its archives that support the theory of evolution, daily Radikal has reported.

The evolutionist books, previously available through TÜBİTAK's Popular Science Publications’ List, will no longer be provided by the council.

The books have long been listed as “out of stock” on TÜBİTAK's website, but their further publication is now slated to be stopped permanently.

A new gameshow on Turkish television will pit rabbis, imams, monks and priests against each other in an attempt to convert sworn aetheists to their respective religions. In Penitents Compete (Tovbekarlar Yarisiyor in Turkish), religious leaders will seek to convert at least one of the 10 atheists in each episode to their faith. Those that crack will win a pilgrimage to the spiritual home of their newly chosen faith, Muslims will go to Mecca, Jews and Christians will go to Jerusalem and Buddhists will go to Tibet, the Guardian reports.

The number of disbelievers is growing, but they remain America's least trusted minority. Why?  How many atheists are there? It depends on your definition of the term. Only between 1.5 and 4 percent of Americans admit to so-called "hard atheism," the conviction that no higher power exists. But a much larger share of the American public (19 percent) spurns organized religion in favor of a nondefined skepticism about faith.

The trial regarding the Sivas massacre was closed by prescription in line with the request of the prosecutor. Thousands of people gathered in front of the courthouse and demanded to accept the massacre as a crime against humanity and hence not to drop procedures. The Ankara 11th High Criminal Court decided to drop procedures of the Sivas Massacre trial in line with the prosecutor's demand to apply the statute of limitation. The final hearing of the trial related to the Sivas Massacre that left 35 people dead in 1993 was held on Tuesday (13 March).

Nineteen years passed since the Madımak massacre at Madımak Hotel in Sivas in eastern Central Turkey, where the Muslim-Sunni crowd that surrounded the hotel intellectuals and activists for an Alevi celebration were staying and forced thirty  seven of them burn to death. According to the European Peace Assembly, “Nineteen years passed since this massacre done  by the reactionary forces under the state protection. But Sivas is still burning, because those responsible for it have not been caught yet.

Tens of thousands of people attended the commemoration service on Wednesday for the 37 people killed in Turkey's central province of Sivas on July 2, 1993 by Islamic fundamentalist. Many of those killed were Alevi intellectuals. Alevi organizations, politicians, trade unions, professional chambers, nongovernmental organizations, and many artists and intellectuals met in Sivas to commemorate the deaths and give voice yet again to a demand to turn the Madimak Hotel, where the massacre took place, into a museum. The police took extraordinary security measures for the commemoration services.