The Crimean Tatar diaspora dates back to the annexation of Crimea by Russia in 1783, after which Crimean Tatars emigrated in a series of waves spanning the period from 1783 to 1917. The diaspora was largely the result of the destruction of their social and economic life as a consequence of integration into the Russian Empire. The Soviet Union brought about the final dispersal of Crimean Tatars in 1944, in the midst of World War II, when it deported all Crimean Tatars remaining in the Crimea to the Central Asia and Urals. This population is considered an exiled community rather than a diaspora. Experiences in exile within the Ottoman Empire There have been continuously members of Crimean nobility in the Ottoman Empire, due to close relations between the two states. There was a Giray vassal state in the Ottoman province of Bucak (Bessarabia). It was centered on the towns of Bender and Çatal Osman, and considered semi-independent (only controlled by Ottoman Pasha in Rusçuk). In the 14th and 15th centuries, Ottomans colonized Dobruja with Crimean Tatars from Bucak. Between 1593 and 1595, Crimean Tatars were also settled to Dobruja. (Frederick de Jong) Some Crimean Tatars went to Greece and Turkey. However, the first Crimean Tatar emigration took place after the Russian annexation of Crimea. Crimean Tatar ruling class (mirzas) and mullahs sought asylum within the North Caucasian people, fearing persecution. Their number were around 8,000. Their relations to Crimea continued from their Caucasian safe havens. Hopes that a Giray from the Caucasus would return to liberate Crimea continued until the very conquest of North Caucasus by the Russians in 1859. The Crimean Tatars in the North Caucasus were exiled to Anatolia in 1877-1878 together with Circassians and Chechens by the Russian Empire. The exiled Muslims from the North Caucasus were around one million. After the annexation, 4,000 Tatars also escaped to westward direction to the Ottoman fortress of Ozu (Ochakov), and from there to the Ottoman province of Bucak (Bessarabia) where the Giray dynasty existed. With the conquest of Bessarabia by the Russians in 1812, all Crimean Tatars here migrated to southwards, to the Dobruja province. Crimean Tatars immigrated to the Ottoman Empire, where they were welcomed as fellow Muslims and as the populace of the formerly protected Crimean Khanate. The Ottoman territory was called "aq topraq" ("bright land" or more probably "land of justice") by the Crimean Tatar immigrants,