The selected area epitaxial overgrowth of narrow gap HgTe as well as wide gap CdTe and ZnTe on CdTe/GaAs substrates, which had been structured by dry etching techniques, has been investigated. A plasma etching process using a barrel reactor with CHCH2 gases has been employed to prepare stripes with a width of about 1 J.Lm with anisotropic as well as isotropic etching profiles. It has been found, that the selected area HgTe overgrowth takes place with a high local selectivity to the low index planes of the patterned surface. In contrast, the selected area overgrowth of the wide gap CdTe and ZnTe is controlled by anisotropic growth kinetics provided that the substrate temperature is not lower than 220°C and the starting surface consists of well developed low index crystallographic planes.