The official statistics for 2017 show that the number of marriages slightly decreased last year while the number of divorces increased. Figures released on Friday by Turkey's official statistics agency TurkStat indicate a 4.2 percent drop in marriages compared to 2016. A total of 569,459 people got married in 2017. In divorces, the rate increased 1.8 percent and 128,411 people divorced last year, statistics show. TurkStat figures also show the highest marriage rate or number of people married per 1,000 is in Kilis, a border city that has more Syrian refugees than the local population. The marriage rate was 9.6 per 1,000 in the city last year. It was followed by the cities of Adıyaman and Şanlıurfa in the southeast. The lowest marriage rate was in the small Black Sea city of Gümüşhane.
The highest divorce rate was in İzmir, the country's third largest city. İzmir usually tops the list of cities with the highest divorce rates. It is followed by the Mediterranean city of Antalya and Muğla located south of İzmir.
Syrian brides made up the majority of foreign brides in 2017. Turkey hosts more than 3.5 million refugees from war-torn Syria, the largest refugee community in the world from that country. Azerbaijani brides were the second majority among foreign brides. For bridegrooms, Turkish women apparently chose German husbands the most. They made up 36.5 percent of men married to Turkish women last year. However, TurkStat did not specify whether those German men were people of Turkish origin. Germany hosts a sizeable population of Turks who are mostly descendants of Turkish workers migrated there amid an economic boom after World War II. Syrian bridegrooms made up 8.5 percent of foreign bridegrooms.
