Turkish settlers in Northern Cyprus

Turkish settlers in Northern Cyprus (Cypriot Turkish: Türkiyeliler, "those from Turkey"), also referred to as Turkish immigrants (Turkish: Türkiyeli göçmenler) are a group of mainland Turkish people who have settled in Northern Cyprus since the Turkish invasion in 1974. It is estimated that these settlers and their descendants (not including Turkish soldiers) now make up about half the population of the North.

The group is heterogeneous in nature and is composed of various sub-groups, with varying degrees of integration. Mainland Turks are generally considered to be more conservative than the highly secularized Turkish Cypriots, and tend to be more in favor of a two-state Cyprus. However, not all settlers support nationalist policies.

Mainland Turks in Northern Cyprus are divided into two main groups: citizens and non-citizen residents. Within the citizens, some have arrived in the island as a part of a settlement policy run by the Turkish and Turkish Cypriot authorities, some have migrated on their own and some have been born in the island to parents of either groups. Mete Hatay argues that only the first group has "good reason to be called settlers".

The aforementioned sub-groups consist of several categories. The first group, citizens, can further be differentiated into skilled laborers and white-collar workers, Turkish soldiers and their close families, farmers who have settled in Cyprus and individual migrants. The non-citizens can be divided into students and academic staff, tourists, workers with permits and illegitimate workers lacking permits. Farmers settled from Turkey between 1975 and 1977 constitute the majority of the settler population.

The policy of settling farmers in Cyprus began immediately after the 1974 invasion. Andrew Borowiec wrote of a Turkish announcement that 5000 agricultural workers would be settled to take up possessions left behind by the displaced Greek Cypriots. According to Hatay, the first group of such settlers arrived on the island in February 1975; heavy settlement continued until 1977. These farmers originated from various regions of Turkey, including the Black Sea Region (Trabzon, Çarşamba, Samsun), the Mediterranean Region (Antalya, Adana, Mersin) and the Central Anatolia Region (Konya). In February 1975, the number of "workers" from Turkey in the island was 910.

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