Democracy is like a streetcar. When you come to your stop, you get off.
If you're the leader, you have to communicate the message of immortality to your people. Because I believe if a leader hides behind a rock, then the people will hide behind a mountain.
Islam is a religion. It is not an ideology. For a Muslim, there is no such thing as to be against modernity. Why should a Muslim not be a modern person? I, as a Muslim, fulfill all the requirements of my religion, and I live in a democratic, social state.
We have never done anything to stop freedom of expression or freedom of press.
Our country and our nation have again only one message to those who attack us - you will not succeed!
Every country needs a strong leader in order to progress.
There is no difference, where aims are concerned, between a terrorist with a gun and bomb in his hand and a terrorist who has dollars, euros, and interest rates.
If we believe in a democratic system, we have to accept the will of the people.
I consider personally the election of Barack Hussein Obama to have very great symbolic meaning. A Muslim and a Christian name - so in his name there is a synthesis, although people from time to time want to overlook that, and they do it intentionally.
Islamophobia emerged from the Western countries, and this is a challenge that we all together need to surmount.
I am one of the first political leaders officially declaring that anti-Semitism is a crime. I expect an official declaration that Islamophobia is a crime against humanity as well.
Family planning, birth control, no Muslim family can practice such an understanding.
We, as Turkey, call on Europe to respect human rights and democracy.
Before anything else, I'm a Muslim. As a Muslim, I try to comply with the requirements of my religion. I have a responsibility to God, who created me, and I try to fulfill that responsibility. But I try now very much to keep this away from my political life, to keep it private.
If the E.U. is going to make Turkey a full member, we are ready.
The foundations of democratic transition should be laid in accordance with a sincere and committed strategy that is supported by various policy tools, and implemented wisely.
Nazism is still widespread in the West.
I am a person who is inclined to define relations between individuals based on principles.
According to this view, democracy is a product of western culture, and it cannot be applied to the Middle East which has a different cultural, religious, sociological and historical background.
In this context, social consensus, and institutions that embody this consensus, must be made effective in order for democratization not to be abused as a provisional instrument to establish an anti-democratic regime.
