Gul: Nobody Can Take This Country To Bad Days

ANKARA - Prime Minister Abdullah Gul said on Sunday, ''nobody can take this country to bad days and cause a pause or delay in acquisitions.''
Gul, who attended a program in private Haberturk channel, said, ''we will achieve this program. The program of the government is not an imaginary program.''
They benefitted from experts and called experts from abroad when preparing the program, Gul noted.
Gul said that they wrote the initiatives they could achieve in Turkey in their program.
When he was reminded about the criticisms that parliamentary immunity was not included in the program, Gul said that this was not an intentional thing and that he considered this a deficiency.
Asked if ''Justice and Development Party (AK Party) is reformist'', Gul said, ''when we are saying freedom, we mention everybody. When you say 'let's limit the freedom', this cannot be made if you defend universal understanding of freedom. Of course, if we did not put forth our sensitivities about fundamental principles of the Republic at the beginning, then some different meanings can be derived. Nobody can take this country to bad days and cause a pause or delay in acquisitions. This country will progress.''
Gul noted, ''there can be marginal movements, people or groups. But, these movements exist everywhere. We cannot ignore this. It will be wrong if we say there is no marginal, no dangerous movement in the right wing or among religious people. There will always be irrational people in every group. What is important is if everything is under control or posing a threat. To this end, we will always preserve the sensitivities.''
Touching on higher boards, Gul said, ''we will make arrangements to make these higher boards give us an explanation for the things they do instead of intervening in their business.''
They were a reformist government, Gul stated and pointed out that they would work with well-educated bureaucrats.
Noting that the government and his party wanted a solution to Cyprus question, Gul said that they would have good will and not have any prejudices for a solution.
However, Gul stressed, they would not forget the interests of the country.
GUL: FREEDOM OF RELIGION IS PART OF FUNDAMENTAL RIGHTS AND LIBERTIES AND THIS SHOULD BE CONSIDERED AS PERSONAL CHOICES''
Prime Minister Gul said, ''headscarf is not an unfamiliar element in Turkey's natural structure. Unfortunately, these issues have become an issue of politics and they are politicized and this is a wrong thing.''
When asked to evaluate words of President Ahmet Necdet Sezer about headscarf, Gul said that these issues were important and that everybody had to be careful.
Gul went on saying, ''we have to look at our target. Ataturk said the target is to reach standards of modern countries and civilizations. There are two main things in modern countries. Democratic standards, rule of law, liberties, and a structure which takes under guarantee fundamental rights and liberties. The second is economic richness.''
''This is our target. To this end, I often mentioned this in the program of our government. We will bring Turkey above the standards of modern countries. We will make radical reforms. Freedom of religion is a part of fundamental rights and liberties and this should be considered as personal choices. We have to regard this issue as how these things are arranged in civilized countries not as inclusion of religious rules in the state,'' Gul added.
Asked if personal choices in public field should be considered as a part of fundamental rights and liberties, Gul said, ''these may be issues to be debated in coming days. But, what I want to do currently is to dominate the real agenda.''
Gul said that the first topic on the agenda is the studies about the EU and the second one is economic issues.
''We should not deal with things that will disturb the natural structure of Turkey. Head scarf is not an unfamiliar thing for the natural structure of Turkey. When people see a woman wearing head scarf, they don't look at her saying 'how strange!' Our basic issue is to sort out the economic problems and to revive the economy. Other than that nobody can start artifical problems in Turkey. These issues can't be sorted out by challenges. It is important to deal with these issues with mutual trust. Unfortunately these issues have become very political. That was the wrong thing. We must not deal with these issues now. I know the views of Mr. President. I know that Mr. President thinks that Turkey has to deal with its real problems. I also know that Mr. President believes in the supremacy of law, improvement of democratic standards. I know how he attributes importance to European Convention on Human Rights, Universal Declaration of Human Rights and international human rights conventions. We will sort out these problems in this framework,'' Gul noted.