Top 10 comments by Erdoğan that made the headlines in 2014

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Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan made the headlines with several statements in 2014. When he was still Turkey’s prime minister before Aug. 10 presidential elections, many of his sensational comments targeted his political rivals – or the Internet as a whole. He managed to stay on the front pages after he won the elections, but his criticism concentrated more on social and historical issues come fall.


1) We’ll eradicate Twitter

Turkey blocked access to Twitter, hours after Erdoğan vowed to close down the social media platform. “We’ll eradicate Twitter. I don’t care what the international community says. Everyone will witness the power of the Turkish Republic,” he said at a campaign rally in the northwestern city of Bursa on March 20. (Click here to read more about this story)


2) America was discovered by Muslims, not by Columbus


Speaking at the closing ceremony of the first Latin American Muslim leaders’ summit in Istanbul on Nov. 15, Erdoğan claimed that “Muslim sailors had arrived on the shores of America in 1178. In his diaries, Christopher Columbus referred to the presence of a mosque on top of a mountain in Cuba.” He also proposed to build a mosque “on that hill” if Cuban authorities permit him to do so. (Click here to read more about this story)


3) Gender equality ‘against nature’


“You cannot bring women and men into equal positions; that is against nature because their nature is different,” Erdoğan said Nov. 24, delivering a speech at an international gathering in Istanbul aimed at discussing women’s rights and freedoms. (Click here to read more about this story)


4) The robot lobby on social media is plotting against the gov’t


During an address to his party’s parliamentary group on Feb. 25, Erdoğan claimed that a series of “lobbies” had allied to damage the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) and frustrate Turkey’s progress. “The robot lobby that they set up on social media hits with tweets. They tell them to increase the number of tweets,” he said. (Click here to read more about this story)


5) Scolding a smoker


Erdoğan took time out of a stroll through Istanbul’s Esenler district on Nov. 2 to take umbrage with a man smoking a cigarette in a nearby café before ordering the municipal patrol to fine him. “You see, this guy is just sitting there and keeps smoking even after the president tells him not to,” he said. (Click here to read more about this story)


6) Foreigners don’t like Muslims, only their money


“I speak openly; foreigners love oil, gold, diamonds, and the cheap labor force of the Islamic world. They like the conflicts, fights and quarrels of the Middle East. Believe me, they don’t like us,” said Erdoğan during an address to an Islamic association on Nov. 27. (Click here to read more about this story)


7) I am increasingly against the Internet every day


The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) quoted Erdoğan as saying that he was “increasingly against the Internet every day” during a meeting with a press freedom delegation in Ankara on Oct. 2. (Click here to read more about this story)


8) Everyone knows Einstein


Erdoğan heralded a new curriculum for schools after complaining that Turkish students know foreign figures like Albert Einstein but not Muslim and Turkish ones. “If you ask them who Einstein is, each young person has a word to say. But if you ask them who İbni Sina is, most of them are unaware,” he said in an address to the 19th National Education Council in the southern province of Antalya on Dec. 2. (Click here to read more about this story)


9) Birth control is ‘treason to the country’


“There are those who don’t want Ottoman [language] to be learned and taught. This is a very big danger,” Erdoğan said on Dec. 8, delivering a speech at “5th Religion Council” hosted by the Directorate General of Religious Affairs (Diyanet) in Ankara. “Whether they want it or not, Ottoman will be learned and taught in this country,” he pledged. (Click here to read more about this story)