World Bulletin / News Desk

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said that his government's democratic move aimed at eradicating terrorism and increasing standards of democracy in Turkey to the highest level, Anadolu Agency said.

In a televised address to the nation on the eve of the Feast of Sacrifice, Prime Minister Erdogan said, "we are determined to create a social ground in which no one will be discriminated because of their ethnic background, religious beliefs, life style and thoughts. We believe that if we can create a fully democratic atmosphere, we can resolve all kinds of problems. We will maintain our fight against terrorism. And we will not make any concessions from Turkey's unity and brotherhood of our people."

"We are aware that terrorism has several other dimensions expect for the military one. Therefore, we are determined to ensure a stable environment and to find solutions to socio-economic problems. We will end all kinds of discriminative attempts harming the social harmony in our country," he said.

Erdogan, who has given few details on the measures and their timeframe, is seeking public, military and parliamentary support for his "Kurdish initiative", aimed at persuading PKK rebels to lay down arms and end an insurgency that has killed some 40,000 people.

As a first step, Interior Minister Atalay held a press conference to inform the public about the government's "democratic move" to address the "Kurdish Issue". Atalay made clear that this was a process where measures would be shaped along the way through consensus of all state organs and all components of the society. Atalay said they would visit all political parties to ask for their contribution and support.

He later met with a group of journalists at a workshop titled "Solution of the Kurdish Issue: Towards a Turkey Model".

Referring to economic developments, Prime Minister Erdogan said, "we are pleased to see that Turkish economy has begun giving positive signals again. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) said in its latest report that Turkish economy was among one of few economies in the world which would grow in the last quarter of the year. We expect Turkey to become the fifth biggest economy among member states to the G-20 next year. We also expect Turkey to become the first economy in Turkey with a growth rate of 3.7 percent in 2010. I believe that employment will begin rising next year. Meanwhile, we expect our exports will exceed 100 billion USD at the end of the year."