Armenian Villages in Turkey May Return to their Historic Names

The names of thousands of villages in Turkey predominantly home to Kurds, Greeks and Armenians will be restored to their original names, prior to the 1980 coup d’état, said Turkey’s Interior Minister Beşir Atalay during a live TV broadcast on Kanal 7 on Sunday.

According to him, Turkey’s Justice and Development Party (AK Party) government  will give the green light if village residents want to restore the names of their places of residence, reports Today’s Zaman. 

On a different but related topic, Atalay also said he believes different languages and dialects are a source of richness for Turkey, and citizens who cannot speak Turkish can use any of these instead.