Germany has become rapidly attractive to Turks – whether for life, work or study. Immigration figures show that a total of 22.525 Turkish citizens received German passports in 2024 – 110% increase in 2023.
Türkiye is now in second place for Syria only when it comes to the number of its citizens receiving German passports.
Alaz Sumer is one of those who decided to apply. Hey to get his master’s degree in Germany about eight years ago. Now a lawyer, he works for a Berlin -based NGO and is completing his robbery in the constitutional law.
He told DW that citizenship is the goal of every immigrant, saying that it is very practical. “Otherwise you are always plaster to deal with bureaucracy – and it is heavy here. It can be a torture to get a residency permit.”
Burak Keselli, for the IT specialist, who graduated from the respected Bogazi University in Istanbul to Germany in 2016. He says that he came for causes of career and spent many years to work in the private sector. Today, he continues to live in Berlin.
Turning back, he says: “I have lived in Germany for years and speak the language fluently. After that time, I wanted to be able to say politically.
As 2025 global passport indexOne who ranks passport from the country’s number, a holder can travel to visa-free, Germany is fifth in the world between the United Arab Emirates, Spain, Singapore and France.
A German passport provides visa-free entry into 131 countries, where a Turkish passport allows only 75.
Dual citizenship a major encouragement
There is no doubt in the citizenship reforms of Germany’s June 2024 that this trend was a major boost, with dual citizenship to become a major encouragement for migrants to search for another passport.
For example, Alaz Sumer says that he had no desire to abandon his Turkish citizenship.
“I did not want to leave my right to vote,” hey says. A Turkish passport he says, so it has been benefited in countries with which Turkey has better relations with Germany.
Burak Keselli is a dual citizen. Hey two passports are likely to be “very positive”, but they say that they will have the way of German citizenship ether.
The previous government of Germany Ach reduced the need for residency for citizenship to eight to five years and below three for those who could show special integration capacity.
The new government participated in May, 2025 with a three -year rule in May, 2025 under Chancellor Frederick Mars.
Nevertheless, the new government has allowed double citizens to stand, which means that migrants can keep their original passports.
It is very important for many of them who have come to Germany from elsewhere.
Until some time ago, Germany needed exception to all migrants as well as members of Swiss and European Union, passport holders, who were renunciation of pre-citizenship before giving them a German passport. This forced many people to search for German citizenship on emotional, family and business relations that maintained with their native country. It goes to the estimated 3 million Turks living in Germany.
Political suppression and sky touching inflation in Türkiye
Political, social and economic status in Türkiye has been a major driver for immigration. “I wanted to be an academic,” Alaz Sumer says, “but I didn’t realize that it was real to do so independently in Turkey. When the situation was determined, I left.”
For Keselli, he says that Turkey will have a “good life”.
“If I had chosen to go to another country [other than Germany] I must have applied for citizenship there. ,
The political atmosphere in Türkiye has been deteriorating for years. Human rights organizations regularly report speech and freedom of press violation by the government. In March, the government of President Recep Tayip Erdogan arrested his most competent election challenger, Istanbul Mayor Ekrem Imamoglu – a rigorous measure from Erdogan standards.
In addition, the country has been economically away for years: in 2015, the cost of a euro is around 2.3 Turkish Lira, now it is around 46 ($ 1 is currently around 40 Turkish Lira, 10 years old was around 2.7 Turkish Lira).
Türkiye always wants to be a ‘home’
Despite the integration and years of life spent in Germany, many Turks here still lie in their old culture and call Turkey home.
Sumer says, “Germany has never been a house for me. I will desk myself as a German. But even if I did, German will be loud and right on me,” says Sumer.
Kesili sees things like this: “All my loved ones are in Turkey. I never lost connections. I will continue to travel forward and back. And even if I don’t always stay on the latest news, I still still listen to Turkish music. I will always stay home. Germany.”
Is German not enough?
Sumer says that he “enjoys life mostly in Germany” in Germany but believes that he does not think he is really.
“I don’t think you immediately accept when you get a German passport – it was definitely not the case for me.”
He then feels that among other migrants mirror those people: “I feel close to Turkey than in Germany. It is clear for me that I am only a German on paper. Even if you assimilate and live with German standards – you are still immigrant.”
Sumer recalls moments of everyday discrimination. When he tried to find an apartment after receiving his citizenship, he says, he did not get any answer to his online questions using his real name. He changed when he changed a fake name.
“If you do not have a German name, a German passport will not do you very well,” they say.
This article was the original published in Türkiye.
