UN Confirms Turkey’s Official Name Change to Türkiye
Turkey has officially changed its name to Türkiye, both to improve the country's brand value but also to end centuries of confusion with the popular edible American bird.
KATHMANDU: The United Nations on Wednesday said that it had registered “Türkiye” as the new country name for Turkey.
Speaking to Turkey’s Anadolu Agency, UN Spokesman Stephane Dujarric said that they received the official letter from Turkish authorities seeking to change the country’s name and the change became effective from the moment the letter was received.
“Türkiye” will now be used in all foreign languages and the country’s full official name will be “Republic of Türkiye”.
The government has been pursuing a strategy to change the country’s name since January, aiming to improve the brand image of the country.
State media have been using “Türkiye” for months and a state ad campaign promoting the use of “Türkiye” to foreigners has been running on Turkish Airlines flights and other promotional tourism videos.
“The process we started under the leadership of our President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in order to increase our country’s brand value is to be finalised,” Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu wrote on Twitter on May 31.
The name Turkey has been used by foreigners for centuries to define the core area of the Ottoman Empire and later its successor state, the Republic of Turkey.
The earliest use of the word dates back to the 14th century, when the Latin term “Turchia/Turquia” meant “the land of Turks”.
In time, the Latin name was transformed into “Türkiye” in Turkish, Turkey in English, “Turkei” in German and “Turquie” in French.
When Mustafa Kemal Ataturk started the War of Independence after World War I, he adopted the name “Türkiye” to differentiate his new regime from the Sultan’s empire based in Constantinople.
The name “Türkiye” was adopted as the official name after the Ottoman Empire was dissolved and a secular republic replaced it.
However, the name of the country is also the same as that of the edible bird, indigenous to the Americas. The bird was named “Turkey” because it was introduced to European markets by tradesmen from Constantinople, today’s Istanbul. This confusion has sometimes made Turkey an object of derision.
