The Bulgarian Turks in Turkey represent a community of Bulgarian Turks who immigrated over the years from Bulgaria to Turkey. They are notable in Turkey for being descendants of Balkan Turks who had to escape persecution. and moreover, part of them continue to be dual citizens of Bulgaria and Turkey, which makes them a natural bridge between both countries.
Origins
Bulgarian Turks are descendants of Asian settlers who came across the narrows of the Dardanelles and the Bosporus following the Ottoman conquest of the Balkans in the late 14th and early 15th centuries, as well as Bulgarian converts to Islam who became Turkified during the centuries of Ottoman rule in Bulgaria. It has also been suggested that some Turks living today in Bulgaria may be direct ethnic descendants of earlier medieval Pecheneg, Oğuz, and Cuman Turkic tribes. The Turkish community became an ethnic minority when the Principality of Bulgaria was established after the Russo-Turkish War of 1877–1878.