Turkey’s Erdogan criticizes his party’s “insurgents”
North-Press Agency
The Turkish President Recep Erdogan has launched a ferocious attack against the efforts of what he called ‘insurgents’ within the Justice and Development Party (AKP) to establish an independent party from the AKP, while he stressed on Turkey’s need to possess nuclear warheads like other countries.
His statements came on the eve of his party’s celebration of the 100th anniversary of Sivas Congress 1919, which was led by the founder of the modern Turkish Republic Mustafa Ataturk, in preparations for the declaration of Independence Party against the Allied Axis after the First World War.
Erdogan used the occasion to highlight the intentions of some members within the AKP to split and establish a new political party, he said: “Those who aspire to harm the AKP because of their political ambitions are eventually defeated, and these projects aimed at destroying the Islamic Party in the country”.
Erdogan’s comments coincided with mounting reports about a possible new conservative political movement led by former allies of the Turkish president, including the former Deputy Prime Minister for Economy Ali Babacan and the former President of Turkey Abdullah Gul.
At the same time, reports and comments from Turkey’s political and media outlets have indicated that these attempts also include the former AKP senior official and Turkey’s Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu, who could challenge the leadership of the ruling party amid the conservative Anatolian Islamist bloc.
In a related context, Erdogan also discussed the importance of possessing nuclear weapons by Turkey, although Turkey had signed the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) in 1980 and the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT) in 1996, which prohibit all nuclear bombs usage for any purpose.
Referring to the international community, Erdogan said: “They tell us that we cannot possess nuclear warhead missiles even though some countries possess them, the thing that we will never accept”.
The Turkish president again revealed that Turkey was deprived of arms deals by the allied countries, which prompted Turkey to produce weapons on its own, by saying:
“We demanded the purchase of smart bombs by the Obama administration, but the request was rejected; and we continued the same endeavors with the administration of President Donald Trump, the request was also rejected, so we will manufacture the weapon by ourselves”.
Erdogan also talked about Turkey’s purchase of Russia’s S-400 air defense missile system, a step that led Washington to expel Turkey from the F-35 fighter jets program, and threat Ankara by sanctions, pointing out that Turkey had already received the first battery of the Russian S-400 missile system last July, and it is in the process of purchasing the second battery.