ISTANBUL,
July 15 (IslamOnline.net) – Turkish and Azeri parliamentarians also
appealed for an international intervention to pressure the Georgian
government into allowing the return of Ahiska Muslims after more than
60 years of forced migration.
"Ahiska
Turks have suffered a lot, and they have the right return and help
develop Georgia," Azeri Deputy Prime Minister Ali Hassanov told a
conference hosted by the Azeri capital Baku on July 13-14.
Other
participants urged the United Nations to get involved in efforts to
resolve the long-standing crisis of the Ahiska Muslims.
A
delegation of 14 Turkish MPs and members of Turkey’s Nationalist
Movement Party attended the first conference on Ahiska Muslims.
Addressing
the conference, the Turkish Parliament deputy speaker said it is time
for the return for Ahiska Muslims to their homeland.
Around
16,000 Ahiska Turks live in Baku and other areas near borders with
Georgia.
They
have been lobbying for decades for the right to return to their
villages in southwestern Georgia from which they were deported en
masse to Central Asia in November 1944.
Ahiska
Muslims, originally hailing from Anatolia, were exiled from their
homeland after Russia seized the region of Ahiska following its 1828-1829
war with the Ottoman Empire.
Many
Ahiska Muslims were forced to seek refugee in Erzurum in eastern
Turkey after being persecuted by the Russian Cesar for supporting the
Ottoman Empire.
Facing
a similar fate under the notorious Soviet leader Joseph Stalin, Ahiska
Muslims fled to Uzbekistan in 1944.
One
year later, they went to Azerbaijan where they currently reside.
There
are now about 15-16 thousand Ahiska Muslims living in the country in
areas near the borders with Georgia.
Georgia
has not allowed their return ever since.
Armenian
Plot
Ansar
Euwart, a member of the opposition Turkish Republican Party, said the
forced migration of Ahiska Turks was part of an Armenian scenario to
create the Great Armenia State, force Muslims out of the Caucasian
region and control oil riches there.
He
called on the Turkish government to run railways with Georgia in order
to send aid to Muslims and abort Armenia’s expansionist ambitions.
Islam
was first introduced to Ahiska in the 642 hijri year. The region was
seized by the Ottoman empire in the 16th
century.
