A total of 88 Ahıska Turks living in the Ukrainian city of Kherson, where the war with Russia continues, were transferred to Türkiye via Russia and Georgia on the initiative of the Turkish Foreign Ministry.
"Our 88 Ahıska brothers and sisters, who were stranded in the city of Kherson in Ukraine, were brought to our country through Russia and Georgia upon our initiatives. Welcome to your homeland!" Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu said on Twitter early Sunday.
Türkiye will continue to stand by Ahıska Turks wherever they are, Çavuşoğlu added.
The Ahıska Turks, mostly elderly and children, set off from Kherson on Oct. 31 to come to Türkiye via Russia.
The World Union of Ahıska Turks also thanked Türkiye for its help.
Since the beginning of the war in Ukraine this year, Türkiye evacuated several groups of Ahıska Turks from the region in eastern Ukraine.
The latest rescue mission brings the number of Ahıska Turks evacuated and placed in an accommodation center in Türkiye since the start of the war to 1,201.
Ahıska Turks, also known as Meskhetian Turks, were expelled from their ancestral lands in the Meskheti region of Georgia by Soviet leader Josef Stalin in 1944. Most of them were exiled to distant parts of the Soviet Union, according to the World Ahıska Turks Association. Some settled in Ukraine in 1989.
The group faced discrimination and human rights abuses before and after the Soviet deportation. Most of the 90,000 to 117,000 Ahıska Turks who were unexpectedly ripped out of their homes and forced into trains died of disease and hunger while on the road.
Currently, approximately 20,000 people live in the Meskhetian region, though a very small number of the population are Ahıska Turks.
The majority of Ahıska Turks still live where they were exiled or in the countries they later migrated to.
According to reports from international organizations and other sources, 550,000-600,000 Ahıska Turks currently live far from their homeland.
Some have made their way to Türkiye while others are in Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan, Russia, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, the United States and Ukraine.
Due to the conflict that broke out between pro-Russian separatists and the Ukrainian army in eastern Ukraine in 2014, most Ahıska Turks were allowed to move to Türkiye and settled in the eastern Erzincan province on President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan's initiative.
