Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan opened the International Telecommunication Union's Plenipotentiary Conference in Kemer, a town in the Mediterranean province of Antalya, on Monday, using the occasion to highlight Türkiye's digital progress.
Erdogan noted that household internet subscribers had grown from 1.3 million in 2002 to 2.5 million, while total users, including those at cafes and workplaces, had reached 16 million. School connectivity expanded dramatically as well, rising from 742 schools in 2003 to a projected 17,532 by year's end. He acknowledged that electronic communication services carry a heavy tax load and said the government had begun steps to ease it gradually.
Transportation Minister Binali Yildirim, also present at the conference, reported that GSM subscribers in Türkiye had surpassed 50 million, a striking figure for a country of roughly 70 million people. He argued that information and communication technologies help nations resolve disagreements and improve mutual understanding, and he noted that Türkiye had dismantled its telecommunications monopoly several years earlier.
Historical summary. TurkishPress restated this wire report, first published in November 2006, in its own words.