section_path: History/Turkish Republic
section_name: Turkish Republic
paragraph_text: Turkish Republic
  
  On 29 October 1923 the Grand National Assembly of Turkey declared the establishment of the Turkish Republic, with Ankara as its capital. Mustafa Kemal Atatürk became the Republic's first President.
  
  A 1942 wealth tax assessed mainly on non-Muslims led to the transfer or liquidation of many businesses owned by religious minorities. The US-incited and state-sanctioned 1955 Istanbul pogrom, in which hundreds of Greek men, women and children were attacked and raped and dozens murdered, led to the emigration of most of the remaining Greeks in Istanbul. Government persecution of Greeks and religious minorities, especially Christians, intensified through the 1960s as part of the process of Turkification. Further mass expulsions of Greeks took place in 1964–1965. As a result of these policies, the Greek population of Istanbul decreased from 110,000 in 1919 to 2,500 today.
  
  From the late 1940s and early 1950s, Istanbul underwent great structural change, as new public squares, boulevards, and avenues were constructed throughout the city, sometimes at the expense of historical buildings. The overall population of Istanbul began to rapidly increase in the 1970s, as people from Anatolia migrated to the city to find employment in the many new factories that were built on the outskirts of the sprawling metropolis. This sudden, sharp rise in the city's population caused a large demand for housing, and many previously outlying villages and forests became engulfed into the metropolitan area of Istanbul as result of urban sprawl.