Decentralized Administration of Macedonia and Thrace municipalities and regions, in this case the 60 municipalities of Central Macedonia and of Eastern Macedonia and Thrace, and the two regions themselves. Covering an area of "Macedonia and Thrace" is the largest of the seven decentralized administrations by area, and with an overall population of it is also the second most populated one, following the Decentralized Administration of Attica. In the revised European NUTS nomenclature, the two regions of "Macedonia and Thrace" together with the two regions of the Decentralized Administration of Epirus and Western Macedonia form the first level NUTS region EL5 (Voreia Ellada). The Decentralized Administration is
Turks of Western Thrace was a measure to avert the possibility of the Greek region of Eastern Macedonia and Thrace becoming a "second Cyprus" sometime in the future or of being ceded to Turkey on the basis of the ethnic origin of its Muslim inhabitants. Greek courts have also outlawed the use of the word 'Turkish' to describe the Turkish community. In 1988, the Greek Supreme Court affirmed a 1986 decision of the Court of Appeals of Thrace in which the "Union of Turkish Associations of Western Thrace" was ordered closed. The court held that the use of the word 'Turkish' referred to citizens