President Erdoğan: We will Expand Our Safe Zone If Needs Be

* Photo: AA

Click to read the article in Turkish

President and ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) Chair Recep Tayyip Erdoğan spoke at the group meeting of his party today (October 30).

Addressing the question of a journalist as to whether his state visit to the US will take place on November 13 as planned, President Erdoğan said, "I have not made up my mind yet. It is a question mark."

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In response to US House of Representatives' recently passed resolution officially recognizing the Armenian Genocide, Erdoğan said, "Genocide is forbidden in our faith. Those who call an incident of deportation a genocide are looking for someone to blame."

Other highlights from Erdoğan's speech were as follows:

'Has economy collapsed?'

"They said, 'We are destroying and obliterating your economy'. They said, 'The economy has collapsed, it is devastated.' What happened, then? Has it collapsed? Is it devastated? Praise to Allah, just as we rose from our ashes in history, we have now risen from our ashes and carry on our path.

"As you see, interest rates are constantly falling. Inflation is similarly going down. If Allah permits, in the earliest time, we will reach single-digit figures. We will reach them in inflation as well.

'It will be too little too late'

"With the Operation Peace Spring, we have once again seen that the ones against us felt the same way as they did a century ago. No matter how civilized, how rich, how developed they seem to be, they express grudge, hate and primitivity at the first possible opportunity. There is nothing new.

"Since the operation started, almost 700 protests were staged by terrorist organization members abroad, especially in Europe. Most of them are with us at the NATO. Most of them are our addressees at the EU. Despite all these, protests are held. Do they say something? No.

"I am calling on the countries supporting the terrorist organization: You are making a mistake, the snake of terror that you feed with your own hands today will bite you sooner or later. When bombs start to explode on your streets, when the weapons of terrorists strat to spill out death, when vandals start to devastate your surroundings, you will, of course, come to realize your mistake. You know the yellow vests, right? They will not be in a single country, they will be in all countries.

"But, then, it will too little too late. Correct your mistake before it is too late. We know that you let them leave your countries with bags full of weapons just to get rid of this trouble. We know that you have taken no action about the terrorists whose names we gave to you.

"And, now, we know that you are trying not to take back your own terrorist citizens. You have terrorists in DAESH. We tell you to take them, but you evade. You raised these terrorists, why don't you take them back? Come on, take them. They don't. Why? Because it is a matter of character.

'Another important step is Tell Rifaat and Kobani'

"Our heroic soldiers and our Syrian brothers from Syrian National Army entered a depth of 30 kilometers in the operation area in a couple of hours.

"They have also promised us to clear Manbij from the YPG. They say that we have 'cleared' it as well. Our armed forces are following it. Is it enough? No.

"Another important step is Tell Rifaat. And we are proceeding to its western side, to Kobani as they call it today, to Ain al-Arab. Terrorists need to be removed from there as well, it needs to be under our control. What will happen, then? Will we enter it as well? No, our Syrian brothers will enter it. The real owners of these areas will enter. We take these steps for that.

'We will expand the safe zone if needs be'

"After our phone call with President Trump, American sent a delegation to our country. They came here, we sat and talked, we made our negotiations. Then, we shared our 13-point agreement with the public.

"An area of 120-km width and 30-32-km-depth had to be cleared of terrorist organizations. We paused our operation for 120 hours for that. Unfortunately, attacks continue. We are scanning the region inch by inch, neutralizing the terrorists and collecting the ammunition and equipments left behind by them.

"I am speaking frankly and warning our addressees: The attacks coming outside this line will be responded in the harshest way possible and we will expand our safe zone if needs be.

"On Friday, we will start our joint action with Russians in the field, we will start the patrol. If we see that members of the terrorist organization are not removed from the 30-kilometer zone and if attacks continue, we reserve our right to launch our own operation. We will take up a stance depending on the developments and bring it into action." (AS/SD)