On 16 March 1964, amid the escalating Cyprus dispute with Greece, the Turkish government unilaterally abrogated the 1930 Greek-Turkish Convention of Establishment, Commerce and Navigation, the treaty under which Greek nationals had been permitted to remain resident in Turkey since the 1923 Treaty of Lausanne. Greek passport holders resident in Istanbul, distinct in law from the far larger number of Greek Orthodox Rum still holding Turkish citizenship, were stripped of their residency and given short notice to leave, permitted to take only a small fixed sum in currency and a single bag, with their bank accounts frozen and their property and businesses seized.
Facts
Consequences
What It SettledIstanbul's Greek Orthodox community, numbering roughly 80,000 in the mid-1950s, had fallen to around 30,000 by 1965: beyond those directly expelled, a further wave of Turkish-citizen Rum, including many joined by marriage or business to those forced out, left voluntarily in the following months out of economic hardship and fear that the wider community would be targeted next. The community continued to shrink in the decades after, reduced to a few thousand by the early twenty-first century, and the expulsion is widely read as the decisive blow that ended the ancient Greek Orthodox presence in the city as a living community rather than a historical remnant. 1 Displaced (Low Estimate) Displaced (High Estimate)The figure for Greek passport holders directly expelled under the 1964 decree itself, distinct from the wider population decline named in the outcome record above: within a year a further tens of thousands of Turkish-citizen Greeks with family or business ties to the expelled left voluntarily rather than under direct legal compulsion, a larger and separate consequence rather than a component of this direct expulsion count. Death Toll AssessmentNo deaths are documented as directly caused by the 1964 expulsion itself. Unlike the 6 and 7 September 1955 pogrom recorded separately on this atlas, which involved mob violence, arson and beatings, the 1964 measure was carried out through administrative decree, currency limits, frozen bank accounts and seized property rather than physical attack, so the harm it caused was economic, legal and demographic rather than violent. 1 Religious DimensionThe expelled and the wider community they belonged to were defined by Greek Orthodox Christian identity, and the expulsion accelerated the emptying-out of the community that has historically anchored the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople's local presence in the city; Alexandris situates the measure within a longer twentieth century pattern, alongside the 1942 wealth tax and the 1955 pogrom, of policies that together reduced Istanbul's ancient Greek Orthodox population to a small remnant. 1 The Event
When It Happened16 March 1964, with expulsions continuing through 1965 1 Principal PartiesThe Turkish government under Prime Minister Ismet Inonu, which issued the abrogation and the expulsion orders that followed it, against Greek nationals resident in Istanbul holding Greek rather than Turkish citizenship, a legal distinction that governed who was directly subject to the decree. 1 Victim GroupGreek nationals resident in Istanbul who held Greek rather than Turkish citizenship, expelled directly under the decree; the wider Greek Orthodox Rum community of Turkish citizens, though not directly subject to the expulsion order itself, absorbed its economic and social shock through intermarriage, business ties and family bonds to those forced to leave. 1 Perpetrator RegimeThe Turkish government, which Alexandris documents initially describing the expulsions as directed at individuals judged dangerous to state security before a government spokesman later acknowledged that, absent a change in Greece's position on Cyprus, the whole Greek national population of Istanbul might be expelled; the measure functioned as a tool of diplomatic pressure over Cyprus rather than a security response to any individual conduct. 1 Status
Official RecognitionNot formally recognized by any body 1 Recognition BasisNo international body has made a genocide, crimes-against-humanity or ethnic-cleansing determination for the expulsion, and the Turkish government characterized it at the time as a lawful reciprocal response within the Cyprus dispute rather than as a measure aimed at Istanbul's Greek community as such. Historians including Alexandris read it within a longer pattern of policies that progressively reduced the city's Greek Orthodox population, a scholarly reading that has not been converted into any formal recognition process. 1 Learn More
The 1964 Istanbul Greek Expulsion, a Treaty Abrogated Over Cyprus
This article records tradition as it has been passed down and reported. Its sources are not yet part of the atlas's verified catalogue.
On 16 March 1964, amid the escalating Cyprus dispute with Greece, the Turkish government unilaterally abrogated the 1930 Greek-Turkish Convention of Establishment, Commerce and Navigation, the treaty under which Greek nationals had been permitted to remain resident in Turkey since the 1923 Treaty of Lausanne. Greek passport holders resident in Istanbul, distinct in law from the far larger number of Greek Orthodox Rum still holding Turkish citizenship, were stripped of their residency and given short notice to leave, permitted to take only a small fixed sum in currency and a single bag, with their bank accounts frozen and their property and businesses seized.
Alexandris documents that the Turkish government initially described the expulsions as directed at individuals judged dangerous to state security, before a government spokesman later acknowledged that, absent a change in Greece's position on Cyprus, the whole Greek national population of Istanbul might be expelled. The measure functioned as a tool of diplomatic pressure over Cyprus rather than a security response to any individual conduct, and expulsions continued through 1965.
A Community Emptied Without a Blow
This article records tradition as it has been passed down and reported. Its sources are not yet part of the atlas's verified catalogue.
No deaths are documented as directly caused by the 1964 expulsion itself. Unlike the 6 and 7 September 1955 pogrom this atlas records separately, which involved mob violence, arson and beatings, the 1964 measure was carried out entirely through administrative decree, currency limits, frozen bank accounts and seized property, so the harm it caused was economic, legal and demographic rather than violent, between twelve and thirteen thousand people directly displaced.
Istanbul's Greek Orthodox community, numbering roughly eighty thousand in the mid-1950s, had fallen to around thirty thousand by 1965: beyond those directly expelled, a further wave of Turkish-citizen Rum, including many joined by marriage or business to those forced out, left voluntarily in the following months out of economic hardship and fear the wider community would be targeted next. Alexandris situates the 1964 measure within a longer twentieth century pattern, alongside the 1942 wealth tax and the 1955 pogrom, of policies that together reduced the ancient Greek Orthodox presence in the city, the historic anchor of the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople's local congregation, to a small remnant by the early twenty-first century.
Cross-Tradition Connections
Associated With
Greece, Countries Those expelled held Greek citizenship, and the measure was itself a tool of pressure against Greece within the Cyprus dispute.
Istanbul's Greek Orthodox community, both the Greek nationals directly expelled and the wider Turkish-citizen Rum community bound to them by family and business, absorbed the expulsion's impact.
Turkey, Countries Ordered by the Turkish government and carried out in Istanbul.
Sources
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