The Compulsory Population Exchange of 1923:
A Brief Note on History
From 1912 to 1922, unrest and violent wars spread across the Balkans, the Aegean Islands and Asia Minor, creating a large number of refugees forced to leave their homeland. Massive population movements took place during and after the Balkan Wars, with thousands of Muslims fleeing their homes in fear and panic following the retreating Ottoman Army. A similar tragedy repeated itself during the war between Greece and Turkey in 1922, when the Orthodox Greek population of Asia Minor fled the country with the defeated Greek Army. During this period, many lives were lost and much suffering was endured, resulting in a significant demographic change in the Aegean Region.
The final solution emerged as a result of the Lausanne Convention on January 30, 1923 and was internationally endorsed in the Treaty of Lausanne – signed by the New Turkish state and the Greek state in July of 1923. This was to be the very first compulsory exchange of populations, which meant the uprooting of around 2 million Orthodox Greeks and Muslims in Asia Minor, mainland Greece and the Islands and then transporting them to their new homelands. The decrees of the Convention of Population Exchange of January 30, 1923 were to be applied to all those who had become refugees since 1912.