Sezai Yasar, the imam of the Central Mosque in a Trabzon district told a congregant, Omer Atalar who always wears a lapel pin of Ataturk that he should not come to the mosque wearing that pin, and that he was committing a sin. He said that praying with that pin was not acceptable practice in Islam. 80 year-old Atalar said that he has always performed his five-times-a-day namaz [Islamic prayer] in the mosque and that he had never heard such a comment before.
Trabzon’s mufti said that Islam does not ban wearing this or any other pin in mosques.
Source: Vatan, Turkey, May 6, 2008
