07 September 2023; MEMO: Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan pledged on Tuesday to punish those who attack refugees, foreigners and scarfed women in Turkiye. In a message on social media platform X, Erdogan said that there had been increasing levels of “harassment” of people in shops, buses and other public spaces.
“Every person in Turkiye, whether a citizen or a foreigner, has the right to live in peace and express their opinion,” said the president. “Some people, because they are foreigners or speak another language or wear the hijab, suffer harassment or beatings in Turkiye. We cannot and will not accept this and we will punish the attackers.”
The veteran politician insisted that the era of oppressors who see Turkiye as the property of a small minority is over. There are, he said, people who still have a “fascist mentality” in the country.
“We know very well who you are, and why you are doing this. You will not go unpunished. It seems that you did not learn the lesson from the slap of the past election,” said Erdogan. “Striving against the fascist mentality, bad political behaviour and social deviation in our country will continue. We cannot and will not allow hate against foreigners, which has no place in our history and our culture, to spread in our society.”
He stressed that his country will not let “a few ignorant people taint the clean record of Turkiye, which has been the safe refuge for the oppressed throughout history.”
President Erdogan made his comments in light of the increasing number of unjustified attacks on women wearing headscarves, foreigners and refugees. The attacks are blamed for pushing Arab investors to relocate their businesses outside Turkiye, inflicting losses of more than $2 billion on the Turkish economy.
