World Watch Monitor | Nov. 26, 2018
Turkish immigration authorities refused to permit Canadian-American Christian David Byle to enter Turkey when he returned to Istanbul’s Sabiha Gokcen airport last week.
After living and ministering in Turkey for the past 19 years, the 49-year-old evangelist was told by police officials on his arrival Nov. 20 that a permanent re-entry ban had been filed against him, forbidding him to ever return to the country.
Byle had flown back to the US on 25 October, complying with a 15-day deadline from Turkish authorities to leave the country after he was interrogated in mid-October during a routine ID check at the Ankara train station. At the time, he had been told by his police interrogators in Ankara that he would not be banned from returning to Turkey if he paid his required over-stay fine when he left.