Armenian genocide survivors

Armenian genocide survivors were Armenians in the Ottoman Empire who survived the genocide of 1915. After the end of World War I, many tried to return home to the Ottoman rump state, which later became Turkey. The Turkish nationalist movement saw the return of Armenian survivors as a mortal threat to its nationalist ambitions and the interests of its supporters. The return of survivors was therefore impossible in most of Anatolia^[1][2] and thousands of Armenians who tried were murdered.^[3] Nearly 100,000 Armenians were massacred in Transcaucasia during the Turkish invasion of Armenia and another 100,000 fled from Cilicia during the French withdrawal.^[4] By 1923, about 295,000 Armenians ended up in the Soviet Union, mainly Soviet Armenia; an estimated 200,000 settled in the Middle East, forming a new wave of the Armenian diaspora;^[5] and about 100,000 Armenians lived in Constantinople and another 200,000 lived in the Turkish provinces, largely women and children who had been forcibly converted.^[6] Though Armenians in Constantinople faced discrimination, they were allowed to maintain their cultural identity, unlike those elsewhere in Turkey^[6][7] who continued to face forced Islamization and kidnapping of girls after 1923.^[8][9] Between 1922 and 1929, the Turkish authorities eliminated surviving Armenians from southern Turkey, expelling thousands to French-mandate Syria.^[10]