Tashkent, June 20 (IBNS): Uzbek city of Khiva will become the capital of the Turkic world in 2020, according to an unanimous decision taken at a meeting of the Ankara-based International Organization of Turkic Culture.

Khiva, with a population of 90,000 people, is the former capital of Khwarezmia and the Khanate of Khiva.

At present, Osh (Kyrgyzstan) is the capital of Turkic world.

The International Organization of Turkic Culture is engaged in the preservation, study and popularization of the spiritual values and 11 historical and cultural heritage of the Turkic-speaking people at the international level.

The agreement on the establishment of the organization was signed on July 12,1993, in the Kazakh city of Almaty.

The international organization selects one of the cities each year as the cultural capital of the Turkic world.

Some of the cities that served as the capital in earlier years are Astana (Kazakhstan) in 2012, Eskisehir (Turkey) in 2013, Kazan (Russian Tatarstan) in 2014, Merv (Turkmenistan) in 2015, Sheki (Azerbaijan) in 2016, Turkestan (Kazakhstan) in 2017, and Kastamonu (Turkey) in 2018.

The international organization of Turkic culture TURKSOY positions itself as an organization that is engaged in the preservation, study and popularization of the spiritual values and historical and cultural heritage of the Turkicspeaking peoples at the international level.

According to Britannica.com, Turkic peoples are any of various peoples whose members speak languages belonging to the Turkic subfamily of the Altaic family of languages, (the other two subfamilies being Mongolian, and Manchu-Tungus).

The Turkic languages are spoken principally in a nearly continuous band from Turkey, Armenia, and Azerbaijan through the Central Asian republics of Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Kyrgyzstan, and Tajikistan to Xinjiang in China.