Erdoğan sets 2015 goals as Kurdish bid, Gülenists

ANKARA

President Erdoğan devotes his New Year’s message to focusing on the battle against the ‘parallel state,’ as well as finding peace with Kurds. DHA Photo

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s New Year’s address has mirrored his priorities for 2015, as he highlighted the utmost importance in fighting the movement of U.S.-based Islamic scholar Fethullah Gülen, referred to by government officials as the “parallel state,” along with pursuing the peace process with the country’s Kurds.

According to Erdoğan, the year 2014 witnessed “a very joyful milestone,” which was the first-ever popular vote in August during which he was elected as president in the first round.

The presidential elections were “the best and the most substantial response given to a coup attempt which erupted in late 2013 and which aimed at the national will and democracy,” Erdoğan said in a written New Year’s message posted on the official webpage of the presidency Dec. 31.

“Everybody saw that governments in Turkey can no longer be suspended via means other than the ballot box and in spite of the nation’s will, and that conspiracies, plots, traps and immoral coup attempts will disappear in the face of the nation’s will,” he said.

The government and Erdoğan, who was the prime minister at the time, accused the Gülen movement of organizing a plot through a graft probe that began on Dec. 17, 2013. Wiretappings, which include alleged voice recordings of Erdoğan and his family members, along with some Cabinet members and a number of businesspeople, were leaked online simultaneously with the probe.

“It has been a year during which the resolution process, that’s to say, our National Unity and Fraternity Project, has proceeded with determination toward the direction that we have designated despite the provocations and attempts at sabotage that were launched,” Erdoğan said, suggesting that those who wanted to turn “Turkey’s greatest project of fraternity” into “blood and conflict” had again been “greatly disappointed.”

Turkey will not bow to any threat and blackmailing, particularly in regards to the resolution process, and it will not permit any impertinence, Erdoğan said, referring to the shaky process aimed at ending the three-decade-long conflict between Turkey’s security forces and the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK).

 “Those who try to survive or produce politics via appealing to street demonstrations, conflicts and blood and tears will definitely receive the required response within democracy and law. The resolution process is the greatest social project and the greatest project of fraternity of Turkey,” Erdoğan said, emphasizing resolve to “bring together the country and the nation with this greatest peace project.”

The president also argued that “traitors” both inside and outside of the country were “annoyed by a great Turkey.” “We will not be deceived by these traitors. We will never bow to the dark circles that have grip on these traitors.”

Erdoğan frequently claims the Gülen movement is involved in espionage attempts.