Turks in Europe

Even more broadly, the Turkish Cypriot community for people living in Cyprus, which is located in Asia, has also been defined under the term "Euro-Turks" since the island joined the European Union.

Conversely, in 1944, Turks who were forcefully deported from Meskheti in Georgia during the World War II settled in other parts of the Soviet Union, especially in Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Russia, and Ukraine.

[citation needed] The colonizers that were brought to the Balkans consisted of soldiers, nomads, farmers, artisans and merchants, dervishes, preachers and other religious functionaries, and administrative personnel.

[8] The population drastically decreased in 1944, when Joseph Stalin deported approximately 100,000 of these Turks to Eastern Europe and Central Asia.

[10] By 1571, about 30,000 Turkish settlers, which included soldiers who were involved in the conquest and their families, or agricultural colonizers, particularly from Konya, were given land on the island.

[14] The majority Turkish-speaking Muslim Roma in Bulgaria, Dobruja-Romania, Western Thrace-Greece, Northern Cyprus and Turkey declare themselves to be Turks, not Romani people.

[18] At least from the 16th century onwards Ottoman traders settled in western European trading capitals such as Antwerp, Amsterdam[19] and London.

[23] Many Turkish Cypriots went to the United Kingdom as students and tourists whilst others left the island due to the harsh economic and political life during the British Colony of Cyprus.

[40] Due to these economic and political issues, an estimated 130,000 Turkish Cypriots have emigrated from Northern Cyprus since its establishment to the United Kingdom.

During World War II, the Soviet Union was preparing to launch a pressure campaign against Turkey and Vyacheslav Molotov, then Minister of Foreign Affairs, formally presented a demand to the Turkish Ambassador in Moscow for the surrender of three Anatolian provinces (Kars, Ardahan and Artvin); thus, war against Turkey seemed possible, and Joseph Stalin wanted to clear the strategic Turkish population (especially those situated in Meskheti) located near the Turkish-Georgian border which were likely to be hostile to Soviet intentions.

[44] In 1944, the Meskhetian Turks were forcefully deported from Meskheti in Georgia and accused of smuggling, banditry and espionage in collaboration with their kin across the Turkish border.

[46][47] Joseph Stalin deported the Meskhetian Turks to Central Asia (especially to Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan), thousands dying en route in cattle-trucks,[48] and were not permitted by the Georgian government of Zviad Gamsakhurdia to return to their homeland.

[50] Then, in 1989, ethnic Uzbeks began a series of actions against the Turks, they became the victims of riots in the Ferghana valley which led to over a hundred deaths.

[57] Subsequently, labor agreements were signed with several European countries- with Germany in 1961; with Austria, Belgium, and the Netherlands in 1964; with France in 1965; and with Sweden in 1967.

In the diaspora (i.e. outside the former territories of the Ottoman Empire), the Turkish people form the second largest ethnic group in Austria, Denmark, Germany and the Netherlands.

As for Eastern Europe, Professor Oya Dursun-Özkanca said in 2019 that there was over 1 million Turks living in the Balkan countries (i.e. Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Greece, Kosovo, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Romania and Serbia);[74] meanwhile, approximately 400,000 Meskhetian Turks live in the European regions of the Post-Soviet states (i.e. Azerbaijan, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Russia and Ukraine).

In addition, due to the formation of modern nation states the 19th and 20th centuries, millions of Turkish communities from the former Ottoman provinces fled persecution and arrived in Turkey as muhacirs ("refugees").

[86] In 1990 Lois Whitman from Human Rights Watch said that the Turks living the Western Thrace region numbered between 120,000 and 130,000 (i.e. between 33 and 36 percent of the population).

[88] The Turks of Western Thrace have protected status to practice their religion and use the Turkish language, in accordance with the 1923 Treaty of Lausanne.

[89] Since the mid-1950s the Greek government referred to the ethnic rather than the religious character of the minority, until the governor general of Thrace instructed the local authorities to substitute the word "Turkish" for Muslim".

[88] However, Dr Hermann Kandler points out that the minority is "essentially based on a Turkish rather than a Muslim historical consciousness" and that this "extends back to the founding of the first of four western Thracian republics in the summer of 1913" which existed for only 55 days.

Historically, the Turks also formed a majority on the island of Ada Kaleh, which was submerged during the construction of the Iron Gates hydroelectric plant in 1970.

Although the majority of French Turks descend from the Republic of Turkey, there has also been significant Turkish migration from other post-Ottoman countries including ethnic Turkish communities which have come to France from North Africa (especially Algeria and Tunisia), the Balkans (e.g. from Bulgaria, Greece, Kosovo, North Macedonia and Romania), the island of Cyprus, and more recently from Iraq, Lebanon, and Syria.

More recently, since the European migrant crisis (2014–19), there has also been a significant increase in the number of ethnic Turks from Syria, Iraq and Kosovo who have come to Germany.

[124] However, since the early 2000s, numerous academics have said that there is "at least" or "more than" 4 million people of Turkish origin living in Germany (forming approximately 5% of the country's population).

As early as 2005 Austrian scholar Dr. Tessa Szyszkowitz quoted a senior European official who said: It is a little late to start the debate about being an immigrant country now, when already seven million Turks live in Germany".

[139] Liechtenstein does not record data on the ethnicity of its citizens; however, in 2009, the Turkish community was estimated to number approximately 1,000 out of a total population of 35,000.

The majority of Dutch Turks descend from the Republic of Turkey; however there has also been significant Turkish migration waves from other post-Ottoman countries including ethnic Turkish communities which have come to the Netherlands from the Balkans (e.g. especially from Bulgaria, Greece, and North Macedonia),[142] the island of Cyprus,[142] and more recently during the European migrant crisis from Syria, Iraq and Kosovo.

In addition, there has been migration to the Netherlands from the Turkish diaspora; many Turkish-Belgians and Turkish-Germans have arrived in the country as Belgian and German citizens.

[152][153] In addition, there are growing Turkish communities in the UK which have arrived from Algeria,[154] Bulgaria, Greece (i.e. Western Thrace region),[115] Iraq[155] and Syria.