16.05.2025 19:51
Speaking at 'GENÇFEST: A Youth Festival' held in Istanbul, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said, "Hopefully, we are putting an end to terrorism and leading Turkey to peace, brotherhood, and prosperity. This will hopefully be our greatest achievement. A terrorism-free Turkey will be the cornerstone of the Century of Turkey. We will gift this achievement to you, our youth."
President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan made statements at the 'GENÇFEST: A Youth Festival' held in Istanbul.
The key points from Erdoğan's statements are as follows:
"EACH OF YOU IS THE FUTURE OF THIS COUNTRY" "I wholeheartedly congratulate all my friends who have worked in the youth branches and fought for this cause. I thank each of our artists who performed at the festival and all our guests who contributed to the program. I thank the young hearts who filled this hall to the brim. I take pride in stepping into the Century of Turkey with such dynamic, knowledgeable, and moral youth. It is a great honor and joy for me to be your companion in this noble struggle. I sincerely say that you young people represent Turkey's bright future. As I look at you, I see a much larger, stronger, influential, and esteemed Turkey. As I look at you, I see hope, love, compassion, and the rich heritage of a great civilization. Each of you is the future of this country. Each of you is the hope of this country. Each of you is the bright tomorrow of this country. You are the color of courage, the image of dedication, and the soldiers of struggle.
"WE ARE NOT AN ORDINARY NATION" May God keep our unity everlasting, strengthen our brotherhood, and solidify our solidarity. First of all, I want to express this clearly. We are not an ordinary state. We are not an ordinary nation. We are not a nation that has been on the historical stage for 100 or 200 years. The Crusaders came from the West, the Mongols came from the East, they burned, destroyed, and left no stone on stone, no head on head, but we did not give up. Remember, Timur came with his elephants and army, invaded Anatolia from end to end, but we did not falter, we did not collapse. Shah Ismail shook our homeland from the inside and outside, but we did not say goodbye. The Ottoman Empire withdrew from the gates of Vienna, from the Balkans, Yemen, Africa, and the Middle East. We lost our lands up to Ankara. We did not say we are finished, we did not lose hope. Remember, we emerged stronger from every period of stagnation. After every defeat, we regrouped. Each time, we rose from our ashes, each time we grew stronger and sprouted. This noble nation you belong to is unlike any other. In our collective memory, in our spirit, in the blood that flows in our veins, there is the accumulation and experience of that history. It is that experience that makes us a great nation. Young people, we are a great nation, a nation that thinks big. Where do I come from? An international meeting was held in Albania. I delivered my speech and then said goodbye to meet with the youth. Because my meeting at Gençfest was important. We are a nation that sees the whole picture, calculates, plans, and designs, rather than getting caught up in details. We will all have this awareness at this point. Is there a problem? With God's permission, we will solve it and move on. Is there a trouble? Hopefully, we will find its remedy and go on. The road is his, existence is his, the rest is all burdensome; you have crawled on your face for too long, get up Sakarya!
"THERE IS A STRONG TURKEY AT THE TABLE AND ON THE FIELD" Is there an obstacle? Is there a hardship? With God's permission, we will overcome and pass through all of them. They could not stop our blessed march for centuries, and with God's permission, they will not be able to stop it from now on. Let others get lost in the details. We will look to the horizon, we will look beyond the horizon. Right now, our eyes are on Palestine, Gaza, Pakistan, Libya, Sudan, and Somalia. Our eyes are on Africa, Europe, the Balkans, and the Russia-Ukraine war. We are working hard one by one to ensure peace, tranquility, ceasefire, and stability. We are dedicating our nights and days to stop the flowing blood and to prevent deaths and oppression. Today, Turkey is the standard-bearer of humanitarian diplomacy. Turkey is leading peace diplomacy in the world today. Turkey is making the most fundamental criticisms of the global system in the clearest way, along with alternative solutions. There is a Turkey whose star shines on a global scale. There is a strong Turkey at the table and on the field. There is a Turkey that manages and directs rather than just watching events from the stands.
"WHILE LOOKING BEYOND THE HORIZON, WE DO NOT NEGLECT OUR OWN STREET" They tried to sever our ties to our civilizational roots for decades. They attempted to alienate us from our identity and culture. In defiance of them, we embraced each other more tightly with our brothers. We upheld our brotherhood with the bridges of hearts we built to the Balkans, Africa, Turkistan, and Europe. Now we are building our common future together with these brothers in a way that will benefit us all. While looking beyond the horizon, we certainly do not neglect our own street. We are taking important steps to develop the front at home. Young people, we are running day and night for the sake of the nation, the homeland, and a bright future so that the castle is not conquered from within. One of the most strategic goals set for the future of this country is a terror-free Turkey. We are making intense efforts to build a country and a region free from terrorism, violence, and the threat of terrorism. We have fought hard to live freely on these lands, which have been our homeland for a thousand years. Our young men, like saplings in the spring of their lives, have fallen to the ground. We have lost tens of thousands of our lives, including women, men, youth, the elderly, and even children, in terrorist attacks.
"WE WANT TO BE PERMANENTLY AND DEFINITELY FREE FROM THIS CALAMITY" Our heroic security forces and our village guards have often become martyrs and veterans at the forefront for this homeland. May God bless the souls of our martyrs and grant them paradise. We have also faced a heavy economic burden. We have used $2 trillion in resources for this purpose. In international relations, we have had to deal with this issue alongside other matters. Our brotherhood has been wounded due to terrorism. Our journey of development has progressed very slowly. Now we are taking very sensitive and determined steps to completely free our country and nation from this calamity. God willing, we will not stop until we reach our goal. We will definitely reach the destination of a terror-free Turkey. When the terrorist organization announced that it would dissolve itself and lay down its arms, some inside were disturbed by this. Those who have not uttered a single critical sentence against the terrorist organization for years remembered its bloody past. Are you looking for those who trade in discord with half-truths and half-lies?
They will almost go to the terrorist organization and beg them, 'Don't do it, don't do it, don't leave terrorism.' Until today, they have fed off terrorism. While sipping their whiskey by the Bosphorus and playing revolutionaries in their own way, they gained from terrorism, grew stronger, and harvested power and fortune for themselves. If terrorism ends, the swamp they have been feeding off will dry up, their schemes will collapse, their areas of exploitation will disappear, and the sandcastles of their ideologies will be destroyed. If terrorism ends, the systems they have been feeding off for years will be disrupted. That is why they are trying to create chaos with their cries and screams. There are those who are so enslaved by their ambitions that they would say, 'Let the terror continue so that the People's Alliance does not achieve this success.' We have paid a heavy price because of their whims and greed. We have paid with our martyrs, with our peace, and with our security. No one should take offense; we want to permanently and definitively get rid of this calamity.
"A TERROR-FREE TURKEY WILL BE THE KEYSTONE OF THE TURKISH CENTURY" In 23 years, we have built roads, bridges, and dams in this country. We have constructed housing. We have opened airports, schools, and universities. We have multiplied the economy many times over. We have revitalized our defense industry. Now we are building our greatest achievement. This massive hall you see is our creation. As the People's Alliance, we are hopefully ending terrorism in complete solidarity and bringing Turkey to peace, brotherhood, and prosperity. This will hopefully be our greatest achievement. A terror-free Turkey will be the keystone of the Turkish Century. We will gift this achievement to you, our youth. Everything we have done so far has been for our nation, especially for our youth. We did it so that they would not have to endure the hardships we faced. We have worked so that the children of this country do not become enemies to each other. We have struggled so that Turkey does not lose more time, does not lose more people, and does not waste its potential any further.
"A BRAND NEW ERA WILL BEGIN IN TURKEY" We want to face both our fate and our sorrow together. Let us live our joy and our sadness together. Are we ready to embrace a common future in peace and security, with Turks, Kurds, Arabs, Circassians, Laz, Alevis, and Sunnis? If so, we are one, we are together, we are strong, we are alive, we are brothers, we are all Turkey. Hopefully, very soon we will free Turkey from a burden it has carried for exactly 40 years. We will do this together. We will do it hand in hand, shoulder to shoulder, heart to heart. We will carry our homeland, our nation, and our state to much stronger tomorrows together. When we achieve this, a brand new era will begin in Turkey.
"TURKEY WILL BE THE WINNER" Those who hide behind the youth to cover up their corruption will lose. Those who openly lie to the youth, incite them, and point to the streets as an address will eventually lose. Those who give the youth molotov cocktails, axes, and weapons instead of pens, books, and computers will hopefully lose. Turkey will be the winner. 86 million will be united. Our unity and solidarity will prevail.
"NOW WE HAVE OUR DRONES, ARMED DRONES , AND AKINCIS" We embarked on this journey together with you . We believed in you, we trusted you. We have always worked for you. There were those who did not believe in you, and we embarrassed them all. There were those who imposed bans on you, and we made them bow their heads in shame. We ensured that we have a much stronger presence in politics, bureaucracy, civil society, and the business world. We increased the number of our universities, youth centers, sports facilities, dormitories, and libraries, and improved their conditions. We mobilized our resources to the fullest for our youth. Like many sectors, we entrusted the most critical sector of our country, our defense industry, to the young sons and daughters of this nation. Now we have our drones, our armed drones, and our Akıncı drones. Thank God, we have come this far. Now we have reached levels that are pointed out around the world. Our love, trust, and belief in you are, believe me, too great to be expressed in words. I sincerely thank each and every one of you. We will continue to walk this path with you. We will hopefully continue to shape the future with the youth. I greet you all with love and respect.