[1] The Greeks living within the USSR had a history of maintaining close ties with outside powers, such as the Ottoman Empire leading up to the outbreak of WWI.

Worries over a nationalist uprising or saboteur activity were only heightened by the resistance shown by Greek partisans in response to the German invasion of their country.

[13] Post WWII, the entry of Greece into the NATO alliance further drove Stalin's distrust of the Soviet Greek community, fearing they had come under the influence of the West.

[14] The Chechen, Ingush, Crimean Tatar, and other minority communities around the Black Sea also faced similar accusations of disloyalty from Soviet authorities.

[16][17] On 9 August 1937, NKVD order 00485 was adopted to target "subversive activities of Polish intelligence" in the Soviet Union, but was later expanded to also include Latvians, Germans, Estonians, Finns, Greeks, Iranians and Chinese.

Gkikas claims that anti-Soviet resistance organizations had coordinated their actions with Metaxist societies in Greece and sought to create an autonomous Greek state in the Black Sea region.

A special case was that of the Ukrainian-Greek Sevastianos Foulidis, an anti-communist who had been recruited by the Abwehr as early as 1938 and became an official of the Wehrmacht, with extensive action in intelligence and agitation work on the Eastern front.

Many lost their homes, businesses, and possessions alone in the various waves of resettlements, not to mention the loss of life from executions, disease, starvation, and exhaustion among the other harsh conditions in the camps.

An exact figure of the number of Greeks killed is virtually impossible, although it's estimated that 19% of all those arrested in the Soviet Union between 1937 and 1938 were executed.

[14] Following Stalin's death, the practice of forced resettlement was abandoned, although rehabilitation was tough for many Greeks returning to a region that completely changed in their absence.