Athens: Late agency reporter Furkan Naci Top remembered

ATHENS

A beloved Anadolu Agency reporter taken too soon was remembered with admiration and affection on Friday in Athens.

Furkan Naci Top, the agency’s chief finance correspondent in Greece, passed away this May at the young age of 34 after a battle with cancer.

Burak Ozugergin, Turkey’s ambassador to Athens, spoke at the memorial service at the Foreign Press Association, voicing his sorrow over the loss of Top, “a very kind and decent human being who unfortunately left us too early.”

“The poet Rumi says every mortal will taste death, but only some will taste life, and Furkan was such a person,” he added. “He did taste life and he loved life in Athens, being a journalist, and I’m sure you all had something to do with this.”

Top’s friends and colleagues from various news outlets attended the ceremony as well.

“The news of Furkan’s death, a fine man and a fine member of ours, gave us a tough blow and a very unfair blow,” said Xaris Papachristou, head of the Foreign Press Association, expressing the group’s “heartfelt condolences to his friends and in particular to his family.”

Furkan was a rare human being, a professional who was full of kindness, modesty, and humanity, said Filio Kongo, a colleague who had worked alongside Top since the beginning of his tenure in Athens.

- Library to be established, to be named after Furkan Top

It was also decided by the Foreign Press Association to establish a library under the name of late Furkan Top, in a center where refugee and asylum-seeking children live, and will donate toys for them.

Furkan Naci Top started his journalism journey at Anadolu Agency in 2013. He was assigned to Athens bureau of the agency in 2016.