My visit to the United States has also given me the opportunity to emphasize the objective of establishing close and intensive links between the Turkish and American peoples, scholars and businessmen

It is impossible to preserve my friendship with people who are allegedly leaders when they are attacking their own people, shooting at them, using tanks and other forms of heavy weaponry.

In this context, social consensus, and institutions that embody this consensus, must be made effective in order for democratization not to be abused as a provisional instrument to establish an anti-democratic regime

Our bilateral relations and our agreement [between Turkey and America] on the extradition of criminals should dominate and precede actually any inclusion into any list.

However, democracy cannot be defined as the existence of parliaments and elections alone.

But foremost, I do not subscribe to the view that Islamic culture and democracy cannot be reconciled.

Even as we ought to accept that each country would progress with a different method and speed toward that goal, the standard for the expected end-state should not be lowered.