Turkey

• Full name: Republic of Turkey
• Population: 75.8 million (UN, 2008)
• Capital: Ankara
• Largest city: Istanbul
• Area: 779,452 sq km (300,948 sq miles)
• Major language: Turkish
• Major religion: Islam
• Monetary unit: Turkish lira

Straddling the continents of Europe and Asia, Turkey's strategic location has given it major influence in the region - and control over the entrance to the Black Sea.

Turkish Australian History

The presence of Turkish people in Australia dates back to the early 1800s, although at the time there were about 20 Turkish settlers. Their number increased to 300 by the 1911 census. Their number declined during the First World War when Australia and Turkey fought on opposite sides. Large scale of Turkish immigrants began to arrive in Australia once the bilateral agreement was signed between Turkey and Australia in 1967. However, large groups of Turkish Cypriots began to migrate to Australia before the agreement. In 1947 the first Turkish Cypriot man arrived and in 1948 the first Turkish Cypriot woman; numbers of Turkish Cypriots than began to increase in the 1960s due to the Cyprus conflict.

The Turkish community in Australia today is reasonably well-established, largely made up of families who have been settled in Australia for longer than a decade and whose children have grown up in Australia. Turkish migration prior to the 1967 agreement between the Turkish and Australian governments, made to facilitate the provision of assisted migration to Australia for Turks were not in fact Turkish-born but rather Turkish Cypriots. The 1967 agreement coincided with increasing Turkish interest in employment opportunities outside Turkey, particularly in Europe. In 1967, Turkey and Australia signed a bilateral agreement on assisted migration which was an important step toward dismantling the 'White Australia Policy'. The Turks represented the first Asian migrants to be allowed to settle in Australia on a large scale since 1901, they were also the first large Muslim population to settle in Australia.

The latest Census in 2006 recorded 30,490 Turkey-born people in Australia, an increase of 2.3 per cent from the 2001 Census. However currently it is estimated there is 60,000 Turkish speaking Australians in Melbourne. Turkish communities have settled in Melbourne especially around the northern suburbs.

Abdurrahman Kuzucu Program Secretary since 1998