PRESS CONFERENCE WITH PM ERDOGAN, 16 MARCH 2010

Number 10, London

March 17 2010
UK

A transcript of a press conference given by the Prime Minister and
Prime Minister Erdogan of Turkey on 16 March 2010.

Prime Minister:

Can I say how pleased I am to welcome Prime Minister Erdogan of Turkey
to the United Kingdom and to welcome also his ministerial team and
also the business delegation that has come to visit our country. Two
million and more British tourists pass through Turkey each year. £6
billion is the value of our trading relationship. There are 80,000
strong Turkish community here in Britain and this is a dynamic and
vibrant partnership. I am pleased to count Prime Minister Erdogan as
one of my friends.

I’ve long been a supporter of Turkish accession to the European Union.

I was able to confirm to the Prime Minister that my position remains as
firm as ever. I have said that Europe will benefit from the cultural,
the economic and political strengths that Turkey will bring to Europe’s
top table and that the reform process led by the Prime Minister, Prime
Minister Erdogan, will remove the remaining obstacles to accession
negotiations and therefore I look forward to working with Turkey as
a trusted European partner.

Prime Minister Erdogan and I also discussed Cyprus. Let there be no
doubt, reaching an agreement on Cyprus will require huge courage on
all sides. It will require bold leadership and a spirit of compromise,
but I believe that progress is being made. I applaud the leadership
being shown by both leaders. Both parties must now maintain that
momentum and turn the dream of peace into a reality for all the people
of Cyprus and Britain remains ready to do what we can to support this.

We discussed Iran. The International Atomic Energy Authority has made
clear that questions on military aspects of Iran’s programme remain
unanswered. Prime Minister Erdogan and I share a conviction that
we must resolve this issue diplomatically and my belief is that the
United Nations Security Council must take action to ensure sanctions
against Iran. We will continue to consult on these issues.

Let me end by saying that the friendship between Britain and Turkey
will grow, that Turkey is a valued member of the G20 and we work
well with Turkey on economic matters, and we applaud what the Turkish
troops have done in Afghanistan seeking to bring peace to the Afghan
people. Prime Minister Erdogan, you can count on Britain as a close
ally in all the challenges we face together.

Prime Minister Erdogan:

Distinguished members of the press, as you know, we are here today
– I’m here with four ministers, members of the Turkish parliament,
in the UK upon invitation by Prime Minister Gordon Brown. We also
have in our delegation business people who are here to carry on some
very productive and effective work and, in fact, our minister who has
the portfolio for trade is going to be remaining in your country for
the next two days to continue to have meetings on various sectors,
so that discussions and developments in the area of business can
continue and grow.

We have had today a very fruitful meeting, both as delegations and
also one on one. We have political, military, economic, commercial
and cultural ties between our two countries and the UK has always
stood by Turkey and, first and foremost, especially in the area of
EU accession and I am fully convinced that the UK will continue to
stand by Turkey in the process forward. We also work closely in NATO
and in line with that close collaboration we act together in many
countries and we are working closely together in an important issue,
which is Afghanistan and the work we do in Afghanistan together. And
these constitute very good positive and concrete examples of the
friendship – the process that we have between our two countries.

On the economic front, the British investors are number one; they’re
at the top of the list as far as investment in Turkey is concerned,
because there are approximately 2,200 firms who have invested in
Turkey, which is not to say that we think it’s sufficient. That there
should in fact be – we believe there should be more investment coming
to Turkey from the UK. And I am also fully convinced that we could
have a lot of investment and business cooperation in third countries.

Another important point in our relations, which you have also referred
to, is the number of tourists visiting Turkey from Britain, which has
exceeded two million in 2009. And then again there are also not just
tourists who come and visit Turkey, but there are also other people
coming from the UK to buy property and to continue their lives in
Turkey, so they live in Turkey now. And I am fully convinced that we
can in the future continue the way we have proceeded in the past.

We had the chance to discuss issues pertaining to the Middle East
and in addition to our bilateral relations it was important and
necessary to evaluate the situation in the Middle East. We had the
chance, somewhat briefly but nonetheless a chance to discuss relations
between Syria and Israel and Israel and the Palestinians. And we have
also focused more on Cyprus and we discussed what we can do to find
the way towards a solution of the problem in Cyprus. And this was
important because of the fact that the UK happens to be also one of
the three guarantor countries when it comes to Cyprus. We have also
discussed the nuclear programme of Iran and we agree that we would
not want to see nuclear weapons in the region and that we would like
to see a diplomatic solution to the issues at hand.

And let me end by saying how pleased I am to have received your
hospitality and friendship from the moment we have arrived in your
country. Thank you very much.

Question:

The first question was about the most recent decision by the Swedish
parliament and the decision of Turkey to recall its ambassador. And
today and earlier the Prime Minister of Sweden and the Foreign Minister
have made statements and the question was whether or not the Prime
Minister is satisfied with those statements made and whether or not
Turkey now contemplates sending the ambassador back to Sweden.

And the second question, this morning when the Prime Minister was
giving an interview, Mr Prime Minister, you said then that there
are about 100,000 Armenians who are living illegally in Turkey and
that you may consider deporting them if your goodwill is not well
understood. What is the limit of your goodwill and what is the timing
of such a decision, if you were to make such a decision?

Prime Minister Erdogan:

I believe that the statements made by my friend, Prime Minister of
Sweden Mr Reinfeldt, are very important. He has explained in his
statement that such decisions taken by the parliament in Sweden are
politicising historical events and issues and that he regrets to see
that such decisions are being taken. He still also assures that the
Swedish people have very positive views about the Turkish people,
that there are many Turks living in Sweden and that they play a very
important role in the development of Sweden. Prime Minister Reinfeldt
also reiterated his support to Turkey and Turkey’s accession to the
European Union. I believe that these are all very positive statements;
when Prime Minister Reinfeldt called me on the telephone earlier he
mentioned to me that he could be making such a statement, so that is
indeed very important and I thank him for it.

With respect to your second question about Armenians living in Turkey,
the figures are about 170,000, with 70,000 of them being citizens
and about 100,000 being in Turkey not through legal means. Of course,
any such decision as you refer to is not a decision that can be taken
over night or that can be considered immediately at all because
there have been many years that these people have been living in
Turkey. What we will do is look at the developments and assess the
situation accordingly.

Question:

In response to the question about bi-developments, do you mean
developments between Turkey and Armenia or do you mean decisions
taken by parliaments around the world about the issue?

Prime Minister Erdogan:

Of course it is very important in this regard to understand that
we have to see that the diaspora does not take the process of this
effort hostage and that the means group does its duty. Because if the
means group can carry on its duty then all of the issues and problems
that we are talking about today will all be alleviated and that will
mean that there will not be any problems in Turkey, nor will there
be bilateral issues or problems between Turkey and Armenia, nor will
there be issues and problems between Azerbaijan and Armenia.

Question:

A question for the British Prime Minister: what is your reaction to
the assessment from the European Commission that Britain’s fiscal
strategy over the medium-term should be more ambitious and that it
should be more clearly spelt out in terms of reining in the deficit?

For the Turkish Prime Minister: you mentioned that you and Prime
Minister Brown had discussed the Iranian nuclear issue, could you tell
us exactly what is Turkey’s position on that at present and whether
you see eye to eye on whether sanctions would be the right thing to
move this issue forward? Thank you.

Prime Minister:

Let me be absolutely clear, we have the most ambitious plan of any of
the advanced countries for reducing our deficit. We are going to cut
our deficit by half over the next four years and we are setting out
– as we have done in the pre-budget report and then in the budget –
how we will do that to best effect. What we will not do is put the
recovery at risk, and the European Commission is very clear that
we should not have the fiscal stimulus removed until the recovery
is assured. We will therefore make the best decisions for Britain,
for British growth and for British jobs.

Prime Minister Erdogan:

With regard to the nuclear programme on Iran, we have had a number
of meetings and we continue to be engaged in very active discussions
on that subject. We always say to all of our friends that we would
not like to see any nuclear weapons in our region, and we are also
in favour of taking a decision globally that would even go beyond a
decision for the non-proliferation of nuclear weapons. What we would
like to see, in other words, is a world without nuclear weapons and,
if this were the case, I believe that some of the issues that we
are not always happy about would be resolved so much more quickly
and efficiently.

What we definitely believe in is that, and we talked to our Iranian
counterparts and we made the same assessment with them and the same
warnings; we believe it is important to have a diplomatic solution to
the problem. Sanctions have been imposed twice before, we have seen
results – what has happened, in other words – and if it is considered
to carry on with the sanctions a third time, we will see. What I
will say is that what we need to do for a solution is be diplomatic,
act diplomatically and find a diplomatic solution.

Prime Minister:

Thank you very much. It is a great pleasure to have you here.