a topic always of interest on tc and probably something similar already posted...

http://www.todayszaman.com/tz-web/detaylar.do?load=detay&link=100734

Turkey’s community of ‘foreign brides and grooms’ expanding

ERCAN YAVUZ ANKARA
23.01.2007

The Interior Ministry has come up with a statistical profile of marriages between Turkish citizens and foreigners over the past decade that shows that Turkey’s community of “foreign brides and grooms” is expanding, although the number of marriages between Turkish nationals and foreigners have been decreasing since 2002.

According to the ministry, more than 79,000 foreigners married Turkish citizens between 2002 and the first six months of 2006. But this number has been declining steadily over the same period, according to the data, going down from 24,842 in 2002 to 16,730 in 2004 and 7,030 in the first six months of 2006.

The statistics provided by the Interior Ministry also showed that during the past 10-year period, Turks generally married same-language Azerbaijanis, as well as Germans.

In 2005, some 14,062 foreigners married Turkish citizens and more than 5,000 of them were Germans. Under Turkish law, a foreigner that remains married to a Turkish citizen for three years and stays in the country for the same period of time may be granted Turkish citizenship. Every year approximately a thousand foreigners are granted Turkish citizenship through marriage.

According to the Interior Ministry, a total of more than 40,000 foreigners acquired Turkish citizenship between 1995 and 2005 through various means. This means one-fourth of foreigners acquiring Turkish citizenship do so through marriage.

In the same period, more than 6,000 Azerbaijanis have become Turkish citizens through marriage. More than 5,000 Bulgarians and some 4,264 Romanians have acquired Turkish citizenship again in the same period.

As for Germans, despite the high number of marriages with Turks, only 629 Germans have acquired Turkish citizenship through marriage over the past 10 years.

Some Turkish politicians also tend to marry foreigners, mostly Germans and French. Dengir Mir Mehmet Fırat, the deputy chairman of the ruling Justice and Development Party (AK Party), has been married to a German for 30 years. Former Economy Minister Kemal Dervişâ€™s wife, Catherine, is an American.

Other such politicians include former Finance Minister Zekeriya Temizel, married to a German; Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) deputy İsmail Hakki Cerrahoğlu, married to a cousin of French President Jacques Chirac, Catherine Cerrahoğlu; and Kamran İnan, a former minister who is married to a Belgian.

A Turkish citizen and a foreigner can get married in any country, provided that marriage is sanctioned by authorized institutions of that country. Such marriages between Turkish citizens and foreigners are recognized as valid in Turkey. But the couples must submit the necessary documents proving that the marriage took place to a Turkish consulate in that country in at most a month. If there is no Turkish consulate in that country, then the documents are translated into Turkish and submitted to the Turkish Foreign Ministry, which in turn hands them over to the Interior Ministry. Foreigners living in Turkey follow the same procedure.

Marrying a Turk no easy job

No matter whether you are a man or woman, if you are a foreigner willing to marry your Turkish sweetheart, you will have to go through the following procedure: You will need four photographs, original birth certificate and photocopies, documentation regarding your residence and a copy of your birth certificate, two postage stamps and an envelope.

Foreigners will also have to provide authorities with documents obtained from the consulate of their countries and showing that they are not married. These documents have to be certified by the relevant Turkish authorities as well. The couples are also asked to go through a standard health check.

Of course a person needs to be at least 18 years old in order to get married. Those who are 17 years old need permission from their parents or the authorized state institution to get married. Men and women who are 16 years old can get married with permission from a judge, while people younger than 16 cannot get married.

It was very interesting actually.
Thank you for posting the article although I have no intentions of getting married by now !!

I wonder what prompted the Turkish government to count every marriage between Turkish citizens and foreigners..
either way its an interesting article .although I was surprised I thought the number of marriages betweens turkish people and foreigners would have been higher...

Foreigners will also have to provide authorities with documents obtained from the consulate of their countries and showing that they are not married. These documents have to be certified by the relevant Turkish authorities as well.
Can anyone tell me what this means? How does the consulate know that you're not married? Don't they mean that people have to obtain these documents from their town hall or something?