Turks in Cleveland

Turkish American Society of Northeast Ohio (TASNO)
TASNO's main purpose is:

a. To create a community for Turkish-Americans and their families living in Northeastern Ohio.

b. To promote and assist in understanding of Turkish heritage, culture and traditions by organizing and conducting educational, cultural, social and charitable events and other activities, as permitted by the laws for nonprofit organizations/corporations.

c. To act as a liaison between the Turkish-American community and other organizations, offices or communities in accordance with the above-mentioned purposes.

d. To organize and operate for charitable, cultural, educational and scientific purposes as a nonprofit organization under the United States Code of Federal Regulations.

e. To raise funds for nonprofit activities or entities, consistent with the United States Code of Federal Regulations.

Submit your Cleveland Turkish organizations and resources.

Tell us about the music, food, holidays, traditions, costumes, language and other qualities that make Turks so special.

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The Sultan Ahmed Mosque (Blue Mosque) is one of the most famous architectural legacies of the Ottoman Empire

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Modern Turkey was founded in 1923 from the Anatolian remnants of the defeated Ottoman Empire by national hero Mustafa Kemal, who was later honored with the title Ataturk or "Father of the Turks." Under his authoritarian leadership, the country adopted wide-ranging social, legal, and political reforms.

After a period of one-party rule, an experiment with multi-party politics led to the 1950 election victory of the opposition Democratic Party and the peaceful transfer of power. Since then, Turkish political parties have multiplied, but democracy has been fractured by periods of instability and intermittent military coups (1960, 1971, 1980), which in each case eventually resulted in a return of political power to civilians.

In 1997, the military again helped engineer the ouster - popularly dubbed a "post-modern coup" - of the then Islamic-oriented government. Turkey intervened militarily on Cyprus in 1974 to prevent a Greek takeover of the island and has since acted as patron state to the "Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus," which only Turkey recognizes.

A separatist insurgency begun in 1984 by the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) - now known as the People's Congress of Kurdistan or Kongra-Gel (KGK) - has dominated the Turkish military's attention and claimed more than 30,000 lives.

After the capture of the group's leader in 1999, the insurgents largely withdrew from Turkey mainly to northern Iraq. In 2004, KGK announced an end to its ceasefire and attacks attributed to the KGK increased. Turkey joined the UN in 1945 and in 1952 it became a member of NATO.

In 1964, Turkey became an associate member of the European Community. Over the past decade, it has undertaken many reforms to strengthen its democracy and economy; it began accession membership talks with the European Union in 2005.

(facts courtesy of CIA World Fact Book)

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