Persecution was intensified in 1914, when a total of about 154,000 ethnic Greeks living in the western part of the Ottoman Empire lost their homes. With the outbreak of World War I and the participation of the Ottoman Empire on the side of the Central Powers persecution against the local Greek element took a more violent and systematic form and affected a more extensive area, including also Pontus in northern Anatolia. These policies included confiscations of property, as well as the creation of forced labor battalions for all Greek males.[3]