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The Ossetians of Turkiye

The Ossetians of Turkiye, numbering approximately 44,500 people, are Unengaged and Unreached. They are an Eastern Iranian ethnic group indigenous to Ossetia, a homeland that is politically divided between North Ossetia-Alania in Russia and South Ossetia, a Russian-occupied territory of Georgia. They mostly adhere to Sunni Islam and Iron Ossetic is their primary language.

Photo by Google. (2026). Image generated by Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite: Ossetian

Fast Facts:

Affinity Group: Persian-Median Peoples
Country: Turkiye
People Cluster: Persian
Primary Language(s): Iron Ossetic (oss)
Primary Religion(s): Sunni Islam
Population: 44,500
Strategic Progress Index (SPI): Unengaged and Unreached
Global Status of Evangelical Christianity (GSEC): Less than 2% Evangelical, No Recent CP Activity
People Group ID: PG024577
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Pray for the Ossetians of Turkiye

Join others around the world in praying for the lost to be saved, the gospel to advance, the global Church to grow, and for laborers to be sent out and sustained in the harvest.

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Dig Deeper (Religion):

Primary Religion: Sunni Islam
Religious Affiliation: Islam

92%
%
Sunni Islam Adherents

Dig Deeper (Language):

Primary Language: Iron Ossetic
Language Family: Indo-European

100%
%
Ossetic Speakers

Media Resources in Iron Ossetic:

Films:
Title Link
JESUS View Film

1 film

Provided by the Jesus Film Project

View all resources

Bible Resources in Iron Ossetic:

Bible Name (Translation) Video Audio Text
2002 Institute for Bible Translation, Moscow ✓ ✓ ✓
2004 Institute Bible Translation, Moscow ✓ ✓

2 entries

Provided by Faith Comes by Hearing

Or check out the Iron Ossetic bible at Bible.com

Linked from YouVersion

View all resources

Explore Lostness and Next Steps

Unengaged and Unreached

Strategic Priority Index (SPI): Unengaged and Unreached (SPI: 0), which means there are less than 2% evangelical Christian populations among which there are no known efforts focused on establishing self-sustaining churches consistent with evangelical faith and practice.
Lostness Priority Index (LPI): Frontier Unreached People Group, (LPI: 0), < 0.1% Evangelical.
Global Status of Evangelical Christianity (GSEC): Less than 2% Evangelical, No Recent CP Activity (GSEC: 1), this people group is less than 2% evangelical, some evangelical resources are available, but there has been no active church planting among them within the past two years

Next steps for the Ossetians:
Begin signifcant prayer and fasting for this group
Send cross-cultural teams to discover and research this people group
Begin gospel seed sowing and church planting among this group

Pray specifically for the Ossetians of Turkiye

During those many days the king of Egypt died, and the people of Israel groaned because of their slavery and cried out for help. Their cry for rescue from slavery came up to God. And God heard their groaning, and God remembered his covenant with Abraham, with Isaac, and with Jacob.
readExodus 2:23-24

As the lost among them labor, groan, and cry out under false religions and sin, pray God will have mercy on them and hear their cries, that He will be their Rescuer from the kingdom of darkness and bring them into the kingdom of light.

Let the nations be glad and sing for joy, for you judge the peoples with equity and guide the nations upon earth.
readPsalm 67:4

Pray that God will use ways from in-person witnesses to digital gospel resources to bring the joy of His salvation to everyone so that they can be glad in Him and sing for joy.

I give them eternal life, and they will never perish, and no one will snatch them out of my hand.
readJohn 10:28

Pray that as people place their faith in Christ, they will have assurance of eternal life, knowing that no one can snatch them out of the loving hand of Jesus.

Sing to him, sing praises to him; tell of all his wondrous works!
readPsalm 105:2

Pray for God to saturate this place with the gospel and raise up believing men and women from among them to share the good news of Christ with those who have yet to encounter it.

Ossetian, Iron Across Countries (ROP3 - 107699) reported in the following countries:

Strategic Progress Index

All

7 people groups

Photo People Group ID Name Country Population ▲ Strategic Progress Index Language Religion
Ossetians PG024630 Ossetians Turkmenistan 2,600 Unengaged and Unreached Iron Ossetic Sunni Islam
Ossetians PG024291 Ossetians Kazakhstan 2,800 Unengaged and Unreached Iron Ossetic Sunni Islam
Ossetians PG024080 Ossetians Azerbaijan 3,400 Unengaged and Unreached Iron Ossetic Sunni Islam
Ossetians PG024308 Ossetians Uzbekistan 11,000 Unengaged and Unreached Iron Ossetic Sunni Islam
Ossetians PG000798 Ossetians Georgia 33,000 Engaged yet Unreached Iron Ossetic Eastern Orthodox Christianity
Ossetians PG024577 Ossetians Turkiye 44,500 Unengaged and Unreached Iron Ossetic Sunni Islam
Ossetians PG024475 Ossetians Russian Federation 445,000 Engaged yet Unreached Iron Ossetic Eastern Orthodox Christianity

To download a comprehensive people group list in spreadsheet form, visit our Research Data page.

Peoplegroups.org relies on updates from the field and other organizations for much of our data, so if you have any updates, please contact us. We use various international naming standards. For a list of these standards and fields, visit our Data Standards section.

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