Commemoration and Memorialization of Ahiska (Meskhetian) Turks in Türkiye Foreign Ministry’s Commemoration Statements-(2015-2021)

This study aims at exploring press release regarding Anniversaries of the Deportation of Ahiska (Meskhetian) Turks from their homeland commemoration statement by Ministry of Turkey Foreign Affairs. Therefore, this article is based on the single official documents as a primary resource. Only one primary source is used to gather empirical data which extracted from Turkish Foreign Ministry official website. Turkey has been celebrating the Ahiska (Meskhetian) Turks Commemoration Anniversary between 2015 and 2021 with a gap in 2016 in which it was not released for the unknown reason. The span time for this research has chosen according to the available official press release and official letter by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The text content analysis is applied to commemoration statements to find the nature of the language used in the letters to define and underline Turkey approach to the community using the commemorative language. It concluded to verify the correlations between transnationalism, commemoration and diasporaziation process with analysis content of the commemoration letters.

. Meskhatian Turks commemoration has been emerged as one of the commemoration policies of Turkey, commemoration is politically and religiously instrumentalized (Hammond, 2020) 5 . Thus, the commemoration texts are carefully studied to find the correlations between Ahiska (Meskhetian) Turks tragedy, their desire to return to their homeland and how their identity is shaped by Turkey. Ahiska (Meskhetian) Turks in Turkey foreign policy, further, it looks into such questions, how do Turkey describe Ahiska (Meskhetian) Turks in the content of the commemoration text? What does Turkey do to outreach Ahiska (Meskhetian) Turks with new identity? Do Turkey diasporize Ahiska (Meskhetian) Turks? For such questions, the transnationalism and diaspora as conceptual framework are utilized as an explanatory power along with the commemoration statements by Turkey Foreign Ministry. Transnationalism for Turkey is underlined to reconnect with ethnic, kin, and religious communities that Turkey sees them historical, cultural and religious affinities. Especially, the ethnic minorities who were scattered in the regions during Soviet Union, such as Ahiska (Meskhetian) Turks. Turkey organizes a series of events on 14 November 1944 to revitalize the scars of the Ahiska (Meskhetian) Turks tragedy or efforts to bring Ahiska (Meskhetian) Turks's historical memory back. It can be called that Turkey's effort is to make the Ahiska (Meskhetian) memory as "International memorial" or "Ahiskan (Meskhetian) Tragedy day". The memorial or memory construction discussed by Timmur Hammond that how Turkey constructed memorial politics of July 15 coup attempt as one of the rare studies.
To reconnect them via remembering them and shaping their lost identity has been one of the core policies of the diaspora of Turkey. According to Schwartz (1982) "Relocation of the past is an active, productive process, not a simple matter of recovering facts. To remember is to put a fragment of the past at the service of conceptions and needs of the present". Collective memory has been utilized powerfully in foreign policy to commemorate with events such as movies, cultural events and identity-based programs.
Turkey foreign policy attentively and closely works with Ahiska (Meskhetian)

Literature Review
Literature of Ahiska Meskhetian Turks is mainly focus on the Ahiskan history, ethnic origin, repatriation to homeland. Literature on ethnic origin are not included as it creates confusion for example Kobaidze and Beridze (2010) believe that Ahiskan Turks were Georgian but are Muslimized Meskhetian during Ottoman Empire. As this literature is eclectic consists of Transnationalism, diaspora and religious in foreign policy. However, Turkey's "commemoration" literature is understudy. Commemoration and diaspora and transnationalism which are interchangeable used with "identity and culture" as studied by Kokot, Tölölyan and Alfonso, (2004 (Hammond, 2020).
Most of the commemoration scholars underline the "memory politics" and identity. Gillis (1994) discuss that identity politics and commemoration are historical. In introduction of commemoration: The politics of National Identity. This collection explores the historical significance of the many ways in which people have chosen to honor the past. Because it requires the coordination of individual and communal memories, commemorative action is inherently social and political, despite the fact that its outcomes may look consensual while being the product of tremendous dispute, struggle, and, in some cases, destruction (Gillis, 1994).
Another concept for this study is transnationalism which is in foreign policy analysis was first conceptualized in 1970 by the scholars of international relations denoting its importance of global interactions and impacts on interstate politics (Vertovec, 2009). This was the first approach to the issue from more statist and top-down perspectives, "transnational" as an unclear concept along with international and multinational understanding that has been used for the home country activities beyond its border. As these terms were more appropriately defined, the top-down ideas of the "transnational" was single out. This signified when the disciplines of anthropology and migration studies selected the term "transnational" and made "transnationalism" a new scientific idea. At the time, the term emerged with the enduring relationships and repeated movements across borders, in which the agents were not states or nations, but individual actors or organizations focus (Kokot et al., 2004). Sheffer (2006) focus on the "Muslim transnational network" that has connection with their homeland political culture. Migrants' political transnational pursuits include electoral participation, membership in third political parties and NGOs or campaigns in two different countries, lobbying, the authorities of one country to impact its policies toward another, and nation-building itself (Levitt & Jaworsky, 2007).
Østergaard-Nielsen (2003)  and "returning to homeland" "Transnational commemoration" as "mnemonic role (Meyers et al., 2009) are highlighted the mechanistic dynamism of Turkey's conceptual shift toward ethnic minorities; such Turks outside of Turkey turned to Diaspora. Taking into consideration the specifically geo-political and geo-strategic values of South Caucasus, the term, "religious identity" describes the hemispheric interests of Turkey distributed on behalf of Turkic nations who were under Ottoman empires. Turkey under JDP considers itself the "defender" of the kin and ethnic people, and reconnecting is a historical responsibility. First of all, for the region the diaspora term is limited to apply, however, as it is a new concept can be studied for the, Ahiskan Meskhetin Turks. Concept of diaspora overlaps as Turkey is not a "sending states" to the South Caucasus, historically Turkey was a receiving country as "host country" for immigrants from origin Caucasus (Putkaradze, 1998) 9 . As the diaspora and kin community are used in "with dense and continuous linkages across borders" (Faist, 2010) rather than linking within the imagery of origin and destination, the new suggestions included countries of onward migration and the multiplicity of spaces.
Joseph Nye 30 years ago, only its relevancy with religious transnationalism in this section will be explored, by this way the religion as a soft power utilized in the 9 Mohajir or Abkhazian along with immigration from the North Caucasus immigrate to Turkey after 1918 USSR politics on the region. After 2008 Georgian and Abkhazian war, the Abkhaz communities turned into an unofficial political diaspora institution in Turkey. Muhajiring as a specific form of displacement of population (Muhajir in Arabian means an emigrant, who has left the homeland) was used in historiography as a term of resettlement from the Caucasus to Turkey in various periods of the 19th century. The Georgian muhajir call themselves as "chveneburebi", i.e. "one of us", "relatives" (Putkaradze, 1998 Alumni, Turkiye Scholarship to outreach to kin, relative and religious groups. Specifically deals with Diaspora, since then Turkey not only engage with Diaspora with state personnel and machinery but it strived to transfer the meaning of the concept into identity-based character. Turkey's Diaspora identity, the way Turkey considers Diaspora is to shape toward its ideological token and to integrate diasporic communities in wider Turkey's geopolitical imperatives has been subject matter in many researches. In this regard, relevant literature has been questioning relationship between Diaspora groups and Turkey during JDP or the homeland/kin-state and the diaspora/kin-communities or Turkey's recent relationship with diaspora communities. Since the 1990s, the word "diaspora" which refers to the narratives of certain groups, has gained a lot of academic interest. Unlike the popular parlance that define Turkish diaspora in Europe and Balkan states. Diaspora was used "to denote religious or national groups living outside an (imagined) homeland" (Faist, 2010) categorizes these groups, can be as well applied to Ahiska (Meskhetian) Turks community. These categorize are 1) Nation-states continue to shape trans migrants' actions and identities , 2) (2020) president of the YTB defines Turkish diaspora in following words "We have 6 million Turks in Europe and elsewhere, we institutionally aim to connect to them to solve their bureaucratic problems they face in dual citizenship, military service enlistment, and education".
William Safran definition and typology of the diaspora is widely quoted, the main description of the diaspora paradigm that depicts the diaspora groups are: Safran categoration of Diaspora is also applicable to Ahiska Meskhetian Turks with following definitions. of integration in the host country; 4) a "myth" of return and a persistent link with the homeland. Safran (1991) and Robin Cohen (1997) supplemented this list of key diaspora features as follows. 1) dispersal from an original homeland, often traumatically, to two or more foreign regions or expansion from a homeland in search of work/for trade/colonial ambitions; 2) a collective memory and an idealization of the homeland and a collective commitment to its maintenance, restoration, safety and prosperity, even to its creation; 3) the development of a return movement that gains collective approbation; 4) a strong ethnic group consciousness sustained over a long time and based on a sense of distinctiveness, a common history and the belief in a common fate; 5) a troubled relationship with host societies; 6) a sense of empathy and solidarity with co-ethnic members in other countries of settlement; Scholars agreed that Diaspora defines an "imagined group of people living outside of their origin country" (Knott, 2010;Vertovec, 2009). In more broad sense, Diaspora is described by Shain and Barth (2003) as "a people with a common origin who reside, more or less on a permanent basis, outside the borders of their ethnic or religious homeland-whether that homeland is real or symbolic, independent or under foreign control." Diaspora members identify themselves, or are identified by others-inside and outside their homeland-as part of the homeland's national community, and as such are often called upon to participate, or are entangled, in homeland-related affairs. For Cohen (2008) diaspora communities can "exist in cyberspace, in a physical location" or as Benedict Anderson (2006) argue that, "through a shared imagination". In Global Diasporas, Cohen (1997) offers nine common elements that contemporary diaspora communities embody. Robin Cohen (1997) thus identifies five different types of diasporas: victim diasporas (e.g., populations forced into exile such as the Jewish, African, Armenian diasporas); labour diasporas (e.g., mass migration in search of work and economic opportunities such as the Indian and Turkish diasporas); trade diasporas (e.g., migrations seeking to open trade routes and links such as the Chinese and Lebanese diasporas); imperial diasporas (e.g., migration among those keen to serve and maintain empires such as the British and French diasporas); cultural diaspora (e.g., those who move through a process of chain migration such as the Caribbean diaspora).
Oktem (2014) Diaspora must be discussed within the structure in "Diaspora and Nationalism", however, nationalism in Turkish foreign policy is not in this study, as Islamism or neo-ottomanism are more relevant. The studies Nadja C. Johnson, "Global Journeys: From Trans-nationalism to Diaspora", 'diaspora' and 'transnationalism' may seem a futile exercise (Johnson, 2012). However, Turkey instrumentalize nationalism or transnationalism to reconnect Ahiskan (Meskhatian) Turks underlining their common language, religious and relative politics.
Aksel (2014)   It used to be a kin-state concerned with populating its territory and homogenizing its incipient nation with the "right kind of people" before 1945. The definition of the "right kind of people" or "loyalists" was not always decidedly ethnic; uncertain combinations between religion and former membership to the Ottoman Muslim (Millet) system always acted as an intervening variable in defining belonging (Kirişci, 2007), and therefore challenging traditional understandings of merely ethno-nationally defined trans-border kin. One may then suggest that the processes through which Turkey has become a "hybrid origin-reference state" endow opportunities to examine changes not only at the level of state interests and deliberate policies accordingly shaped policies on somewhat predetermined kin communities, but also in the constitutive identification, definition, delineation, and (sub)classification practices such as "politics of identification" (Brubaker & Kim, 2011). Under this light, Turkey as a kin state has "historical responsibility" to intervene in matters of ethnically, culturally and religiously affinity with groups.
William Safran, in his study, "Diasporas in Modern Societies: Myths of Homelands and Return" (1991), draws up a general framework of an ideal type of diaspora. He defines diaspora as "expatriate minority communities" that are: 1) dispersed from an original centre to at least two peripheral places; 2) maintain a memory, vision or myth about their original homeland; 3) believe they are not fully accepted by their host country; 4) see the ancestral home as a place of eventual return, when the time is right; 5) are committed to the maintenance and restoration of this homeland; and 6) of which the group's consciousness and solidarity are importantly defined by this continuing relationship with the homeland (Safran, 1991 It is significant to explore religion (Islam) as an instrument or a statecraft Religion as a statecraft in the foreign affairs means how the government manage and conduct the religious discourse in the foreign policy making (Haynes, 2008;Haynes, 2014). Religion as an instrument or as a statecraft is used interchangea- Turkey since in 1956 (Polat, 2012) mainly in the United States, Kazakhistan, and Turkey.
As mentioned before Ahiska means Vatan that referred to homeland in Turkish it doesn't mean a geographical location rather a home that attached to Ahiskan identity. One of the recent activities by Turkey was to bring Ahiskan Meskhatian Turks from during the war in Ukraine to Turkey. Around 1131 Ahiskan Meskhatian Turks were transferred from Ukraine to Turkey, Elazig (Ozturk, 2022). Sahin (2014) underlines the strategical importance of Ahiska in Turkish foreign policy in term of geological, geo-economics and geo-cultural.
Ahiska region constitute a bridge between Turkey and Caucasus to reach out to the Turkish speaking world, another important aspect of the region between two Muslim populated regions in Georgia Borchali and Adjara that has potential to connect and unified Islamic world, Ahiska is on the route of energy and transit pipelines. It is having land connection to Azerbaijan, Armenia and Georgia, with these all imperative geo-strategical explanation of Ahiska holds a special location in Turkish foreign policy to protect Turkey interests in the region (Sahin, 2014).
Besides that, there are 25,000 Ahiskan live in Turkey form a political organization to push Turkey deal with their repatriation and returning back Akhaliskhie in the Samtskha Javahati region. Turkey has series of the activities in on Ahiska with its organization and institutions. TIKA is one of the organizations to support with diverse projects such as agricultural, cultural, education and economic projects. The following table shows the TIKA projects between 2006 and 2019 in the area in which Ahiskan Meskhatian Turks live.

Methodology
The research is qualitative method which based on document analysis. In fact, qualitative content analysis, a type of content analysis, would be defined as a data gathering technique designed for the "subjective interpretation" of the content of corpus through the systematic classification process of coding and identifying concepts, themes or patterns. Qualitative content analysis goes beyond simply counting words or analyzing "objective" content and meaning conveyors from texts to study meanings, themes and patterns that may be latent, implied or buried in a particular text or format (Hsieh & Shannon, 2005). It enables researchers to realize social reality in a subjective but scholarly fashion. The examination of the content of communication is referred to as content analysis, and it is a research approach. For this reason, content analysis may be used to almost any text or media that has a message to impart. Articles, websites, journals, lectures, letters, interviews, pictures, videos and other categories (Pashakhanlou, 2017).
To conduct a content analysis on a text, the text should first be coded or broken down into suitable categories on a variety of levels like word, phrase, sentence, paragraph or thematically classified, and then scrutinized using conceptual, relational and thematic analysis (Stemler, 2000). The commemorative language in the letters has been selected to scrutinized to apply content analysis of religious identity, ethnic identity and diasporization process. Statements in commemoration letters are taken as direct quotation. Since the 73 rd , 74 th commemoration statements content is similar; thus, quotations were excluded but interpreted as content analysis in discussion section. 72 th commemoration in 2016 has not been published due to unknown reasons. The commemoration statements for each year except 2016 listed at the end of the research in order.

Turkey
The research question about which ethnic group or communities from Georgia that Turkey pursues to transfer to diaspora is undoubtedly are Ahiska (Meskhetian) Turks Analyzing the Turkey's commemoration of Meskhetian deportation from Ahiska Region of the Georgia. Turkey traditionally has been commemorating Meskhetian deportation from Samtskhe-Javakheti.region into other regions under the Soviet Union that resulted in mass death called as genocide by global Meskhetians. Turkey pays special attention on this day and organizes a series of events on 14 November 1944 to revitalize, remember and shapes the scars of the tragedy. In order to understand the identity and political landscape transformation in Turkey, it is important to mention the identity is centered on Islamist-Nationalist Politics. Along with other terms and discourses, the Millet (National) and Vatan (homeland) are two main discourses have re-indoctrinated and re-islamicized as political parlance during JDP as further integrate into Pan Turkic ideas after JDP.
Unlike other former government diaspora policies, JDP's policy can be described as peaceful and a bridge between host and homeland countries. The JDP government applied the ethnic minorities, kin community and diasporas politi- In 75 th commemoration Turkey use "homeland", "turn" and "deportation".
Turkey uses repatriation as a legality of the return. As expected, that Turkey under JDP instrumentalized kin and ethnic communities in its foreign policy. Turkey don't see Ahiska (Meskhetian) Turks community as "other" however, as it is demonstrated in the commemoration letters that Turkey see them as "brothers and sisters". In 71 st anniversary commemoration statements in 2015 Ahiska (Meskhetian) Turks is defined as "kin community" unlike past year commemoration content, the word of Ahiska (Meskhetian) Turks was more common. This demonstrates that the different perspective of the Foreign Ministry came into existence, and Turkey began a staunch supporter of the global Ahiska (Meskhetian) Turks. In the statement, Turkey claims that "the repatriation process is slow but Turkey does its utmost effort to make their cause global". In 71 st commemoration Turkey vowed to continue to work support the repatriation and organizes activities toward that cause. After the first commemoration, the word of "support" for the cause of the Ahiska (Meskhetian) Turks has been uttered. In 71 st the first commemoration TFA mentions that Ahiska (Meskhetian) Turks must return to the Georgia to live with Georgian in harmony.
In 73 th commemoration statement, the language of the press release remained same with repetition that underlines Turkey supports for their repatriation where ever they are. The religious tone is also changed in the commemoration letters, starting 2017 until 2021-year Allah (Arabic) more religiously is used instead of Tanri (God) more secularly in English. That indicates that after 2017, religious tone in foreign ministry became common in the official statement that In 77 the anniversary of the deportation and commemoration, Turkey's Foreign Ministry released a letter that one sentence reads as "As before, we will continue to follow closely the return of Ahiska Turks to their motherland and to give necessary support to our kinsmen".
Almost in all commemoration statements Turkey pledges to support Ahiska can pass down to the next generation. This objective is very consistent with research question that Turkey seeks to solidify the links between ethnic minorities' identities, diaspora and transnational activities.
In 77 th anniversary of the deportation and commemoration letter, "As before, we will continue to follow closely the return of Ahiska Turks to their motherland and to give necessary support to our kinsmen". It is seen that Turkey shapes the creation of the Ahiska (Meskhetian) Turks diaspora or diasporization of the

Conclusion
Study concludes that comparing and contrasting Safran and Robin paradigm of the diaspora revealed main points assessing that Turkey justifies Meskhetian Turks aspiration to return. Especially, Robin's 4.5.6. article can be applied to the Meskhetian Turks. Meskhetian Turks developed the sense of "belonging" and "returning" to their homeland which they have imagined for. Our study provides that Turkey's transnational and diaspora process has been confirmed on Ahiska (Meskhetian) Turks community. However, the diaspora process is externally transforming, due to the less Ahiska (Meskhetian) Turks population in Georgia.
As expected, the language of the letters confirmed that Turkey instrumentalize the community in its foreign policy. Turkey commemorative statements and textual context demonstrate that Turkey utilizes many diasporic and transnational elements to outreach to the communities. Also, demonstrated that Turkey politically memorialized Ahiskan Meskhatian Turks by a series of memorial and ceremonial events with religious, political, historical and cultural elements. The Turkish government changed the essence meaning of diaspora structurally, and further institutionalized the diaspora under party agenda. Turkey relationship with kin, relative or religious groups in around the world doesn't fall under the diaspora category however as Turkey doesn't define them as diaspora yet, Turkey defines them "member of imagined homeland" brothers, relative, kin and fellow Muslim, thus it is found out that there is correlation between Turkey's new foreign policy mechanism, institutions and ideas rebranded as seen in literature to reach out not only diasporic groups but "all sort of social formation who is transnationally active" (Faist, 2010). Commemoration culture of Turkey is confirmed that Turkey officially initiates ceremonial events to shape the public memory regarding the historical narrative. Turkey's relationship with kindred communities the South Caucasus is mapping the conceptional and ideological token of JDP. It mainly gained popularity after JDP openly revealed its identity and discourses that underpinning Islam in party activities and speeches of officials regarding kindred communities and AhiskanMeskhatian Turks are one of the communities that Turkey instrumentalized religious, nationalistic and political discourse to shape the community's identity. A. Alkan