GAGAUZIA or GAGAUZ YERI, officially the AUTONOMOUS TERRITORIAL UNIT OF GAGAUZIA is an autonomous region of MOLDOVA. Its autonomy is ethnically motivated by the predominance of the Gagauz people, who are primarily Orthodox Turkic-speaking people. GAGAUZ YERI literally means „place of the Gagauz”.
    According to some theories, the Gagauz people descend from the Seljuq Turks who settled in DOBRUJA following the Anatolian Seljuq Sultan IZZEDDIN KEYKAVUS II (1236–1276).
     More specifically, one clan of Oghuz Turks is known to have migrated to the Balkans during intertribal conflicts with other Turks. This Oghuz Turk clan converted from Islam to Orthodox Christianity after settling in medieval Bulgaria, and were called Gagauz Turks. A large group of the Gagauz later left BULGARIA and settled in southern BESSARABIA, along with a group of ethnic Bulgarians.
      According to other theories, Gagauz are descendants of Kutrigur Bulgarians (i.s.).