Hatay Governor Rahmi Doğan stated that there are 370 thousand 260 Syrians living in the city, and that the claim that “4 out of every 3 newborns are Syrians” does not reflect the truth.
Doğan gave information about the Syrians living in the city in the program where he met with journalists in the governorship.
Stating that Hatay hosts more Syrians than other cities due to its neighbor to the Syrian border, Doğan said, “There have been some public rumors lately that Hatay has almost been occupied by Syrians and similar statements. It is not possible for the State of the Republic of Turkey to allow such a thing.” said.
Doğan said that Hatay is one of the provinces most affected by immigration and immigrants, but that this should not be considered as an “unexecutable process”.
Stating that the population of Hatay is 1 million 670 thousand 712 excluding Syrians, Doğan said: “There are 429 thousand 121 Syrians in Hatay who are taken under temporary protection. When we compare this to our population, the number of people under temporary protection in our real population is actually 20 percent of the population. This figure is greatly exaggerated. There are those who say, 'Actually, 4/3 of the population is Syrian, 70 percent of Hatay is Syrian', but these do not reflect the truth. Syrians under temporary protection in Hatay are 20 percent of the real population of the city, but we also had our police and gendarmerie units do a de facto census last December. We have counted the households. We have determined the number of Syrians actually living in Hatay. The actual number of Syrians living in Hatay is 370 thousand 260. This is about 18 percent of Hatay's population. Among those who left here are those who went to other provinces of Turkey for education, work, trade or various reasons or returned to their country voluntarily.”
Newborn 4 out of 1 babies is Syrian
Governor Doğan stated that 12 thousand 32 births took place in all hospitals in Hatay in the last 783 months, and they determined that 22 thousand 779 of them were babies of Turkish citizens and 10 thousand 4 of them were babies born in Hatay. This corresponds to a figure close to 4 in 1 children. Therefore, as such an exaggeration, the statement that '70 percent of the children born are Syrians, 4/3 of them are Syrians' is completely wrong and a distortion. It's playing with numbers. These are the real numbers and records are kept.” used the expressions.
Stating that 506 thousand 280 people returned to their country within the scope of voluntary repatriation throughout Turkey, Doğan stated that 259 thousand 86 of them left from Hatay.
Pointing out that there is a perception that Syrians are more involved in various crimes in the city, Doğan continued his speech as follows: “There is a perception that the Syrians are the cause of the crime. In our statistics, the number of Syrians involved in crime in Hatay is around 4 percent. This figure is very low. When we look at the types of these crimes, they are in the form of petty taunts and minor judicial incidents. This rate is far below the public order incidents in Turkey. Since these people are already under protection, we deport them when they are involved in any crime. This is really important. They are very careful because they know this. They try to abide by the rules we set. As the governorship, we hold meetings with Syrian opinion leaders living in our province from time to time and convey the sensitivities of our citizens to them.”
Doğan added that they have taken serious measures at the border against illegal immigration, and that Hatay is a new province closed to Syrian registration.
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