ARTVIN

city, northeastern Turkey, on the oruh River near the Georgian border. A local market for agricultural and animal products, it is linked by road with its port of Hopa to the northwest, which is on the Black Sea, and with Erzurum to the south. The population includes many Georgians, Kurds, and Lazes. Together with the neighbouring region of Kars, Artvin was ceded to Russia at the conclusion of the Russo-Turkish War of 187778. It was returned to Turkey by a treaty between Turkey and Soviet Russia signed at Brest-Litovsk in 1918. Pop. (1990) 20,306.