 On behalf of the World Economic Forum, thank you very much for joining us here in Istanbul for the World Economic Forum special meeting on unlocking resources for regional development. My name is Nicholas Davis. I am the director and head of Europe and it's my pleasure to officially declare this meeting open. Our hope is that this meeting today and throughout the day tomorrow will help you and the opportunities for you all to build trusted relationships, to exchange ideas and to plan activities, to help unlock regional assets and create the conditions for long-term prosperity for all across Europe, the Middle East, North Africa and Eurasia. As you will have seen from the meeting program, we have organized the discussions over the coming days into four distinct pillars or tracks. This will allow you to navigate the sessions and find the interactions and participants and discussions that will be most valuable to you. These four tracks, firstly around shifting energy dynamics, secondly infrastructure as a platform for growth, third building entrepreneurial and inclusive economies and finally a track around the future of Turkey and the region. I would like to take this opportunity to thank very much all our partners and members who make these meetings possible, particularly our regional strategic industry and other partners as well as our government partners who have worked hard to make sure that this is a true opportunity for collaboration. I'd further like to welcome you on behalf of the Forum's Europe community for this is also a Europe meeting as well as a meeting for the region of Eurasia and the Middle East, North Africa. With that, I am now extremely honored to welcome to the stage the President of Turkey, His Excellency Recep Tayyip Erdogan and the Executive Chairman and Founder of the World Economic Forum. Professor Klaus Schwab. Excellency Recep Tayyip Erdogan, President of the Republic of Turkey, Distinguished Heads of State of Government, Excellencies, Ladies and Gentlemen and Dear Friends, Welcome to the World Economic Forum's Meeting on Unlucking Resources for Regional Development. It is a great privilege to be back in Istanbul and to be accompanied by over 500 leaders from the Forum's communities, from all over the world and particularly from Europe, the Middle East and Eurasia. I first came to Turkey over 40 years ago and we held our first World Economic Forum Meeting in this country in the 70s. Turkey has become close to my heart, to the World Economic Forum's heart and I am a strong admirer of this country with its history, its culture and particularly with its hospitable and warm people. On behalf of all the participants, Mr. President, I would like to congratulate you for having recently become the 12th but the first directly elected President of Turkey. We appreciate the opportunity at the early stages of your mandate to listen to you and to the members of your government and to hear about your vision for the future trajectory of Turkey. Mr. President, under your leadership, the country has experienced a dramatic improvement of its economy and Turkey has become a key player in global geopolitics and geoeconomics as it will be expressed in your presidency of the G20 Group next year. Just to illustrate the resilience of the Turkish economy and its potential for further rapid growth, Turkey's unemployment rate, currently below 9%, is lower than the 28 European Union member state average. And if you look at the GDP output of the European Union compared to Turkey since 2008, the EU is still $1 trillion below its high point and Turkey, on the other hand, can look back at the cheaper GDP growth of over 12% since 2008. President Erdogan, with your reform policies, the taming of inflation and the increase in foreign investment, you have certainly delivered prosperity to the Turkish people. The world has entered the new phase of what some people call global disorder. Turkey, with its strong strategic positioning, its economic strengths and its cultural and political ties within the region and with the rest of Europe, is destined to be an important stabilizing factor. It's a key question which will dominate our meeting over the next 48 hours is how can we reduce the sources of instability in the world and particularly in this region? One of the main drivers of destructive influences of non-state actors is certainly the inability to provide young people with jobs and with hope. We urgently need, as we stipulate it in the theme for this meeting, we have to unlock resources for regional development. Creating decent jobs is just one challenge. There are many global challenges we have to confront in our complex, interconnected and fast-moving world. The fight against terrorism has certainly the highest priority. There is no doubt that Turkey is a country that comparts terrorism in every form and Mr. President, your recent speech in York reinforced Turkey's ongoing commitment to work for peace and stability. You have already demonstrated great solidarity. You and your country earn the admiration, respect and support of the world for your humanitarian action of welcoming over 1.5 million refugees on your soil. We should never forget the absolute tragedy of every single displaced person and every life lost everywhere in the world. We all have here a responsibility. The peaceful resolution of conflicts is not only the hopeful result of international politics, it requires also the strong engagement of everybody of us. Before we start the session, let me acknowledge particularly the presence of His Excellency Georgi Mark Vilashvili, the President of Georgia, His Excellency Atanbayev, the President of the Kyrgyz Republic, His Excellency Musa Mara, the Prime Minister of Mali and His Excellency Barzani, the Prime Minister of the Kurdistan Regional Government of Iraqi Kurdistan. And let me thank you all very much for joining us here for this important meeting at a very crucial time. Ladies and gentlemen, please join me in welcoming President Erdogan. Distinguished heads of state and government, distinguished ministers, distinguished participants, ladies and gentlemen, I would like to greet you wholeheartedly and express my best wishes to this special meeting of the World Economic Forum, organized in Istanbul for these two days. I would like to express my thanks, especially to Professor Schwab and his wife and all the staff at the World Economic Forum for organizing this special meeting in Turkey in Istanbul. I also would like to welcome all our guests attending this special meeting and thank them in advance for their contributions during the discussions at this important special meeting. Distinguished guests and dear friends, we live at a time when we see significant shifts in the international system where we see the emergence of political, economic and social cultural fault lines in many different parts of the world. And these fault lines are very much present and clear at this point. And we see economic crises, poverty, lack of a balance in income distribution, pressure on energy resources, and all of these developments create various crises for countries and societies. We also see significant damage as a result of policies of intimidation and oppression carried out by some regimes against their own people in some countries. Terrorism is getting more global and is having a greater impact on a broader geography, thereby threatening global peace. In Turkey, we have terrorism, a national phenomenon as terrorism, and we also are confronted with terrorist threats in a regional context as well as in an international context. And there are a number of other significant challenges on our global agenda such as climate change, communicable diseases like Ebola, environmental pollution, migration, xenophobia and racism. They continue to be important parts of our global agenda today. I'd like to say that these challenges are now so great that they threaten not only some countries or some regions to the country. They are so important now that they threaten all of the globe, and it seems impossible for any country to meet those challenges on their own. Therefore, it has become imperative for global political and economic organizations to join forces in order to meet the challenges of our century. And I have expressed my views to this effect at the 69th General Assembly of the United Nations in New York last week. And I underlined during my bilateral meetings and also at the Climate Summit and at the General Assembly the fact that these problems are now very seriously threatening mankind and I underlined the importance of taking immediate action to counter them. But unfortunately, international political and economic organizations, and especially the United Nations are ineffective in terms of establishing measures to meet and resolve these problems that threaten mankind. And I'd like to say here something that I said at the General Assembly. And I've said it many times when I was Prime Minister and I will repeat this point again. The world is bigger than five. It cannot be that only five countries can determine the fate of the world. The world now is not the same world as it was immediately after the Second World War. And in all of my bilateral meetings I met heads of state or heads of government. They all tell me that I am right in making this point. And they say they agree with me that the world is bigger than five. But when they go up on the rostrum to speak to these factors or these issues we do not speak about them. So if we believe that there has to be reforms in the United Nations then we have to start planning for those reforms if we believe in what we think. But unfortunately the steps are not taken in this regard and people are perhaps worried about what other countries will say if they make this point. What country A will say or country B or another country will say. But no one seems to be thinking about the following fact. For example, President Obama in his speech said that the world should be a world where right makes might. This is what we would like to see. We would like to see a world where right makes might. And if this is what we would like to see then these five countries should not be dominating the fate of the world on their own. So what needs to be done? There has to be a system of rotation. In other words, there should be representatives or countries representing all continents. This is how the UN Security Council has to be formed and there should not be any distinction between a permanent member and a non-permanent member. If the Security Council is to have 15 members then all of those 15 members can rotate every year or every two years. But they should all rotate. The UN has 193 member states at the moment and with this rotation it will be possible for all member states of the United Nations to serve at the UN Security Council. Our future should not be dependent on only what the five permanent members at the UN will say. There is oppression in Iraq, in Syria. There is a lot going on there. And everybody is looking to the UN Security Council with respect to what decisions can be taken. And what about those five countries? And everybody is looking to see what those five countries will say even what one or two of the five countries will say because if only one country vetoes a decision that decision is not accepted. It does not pass. So is the whole world dependent on what one member state will say? We have to change this. It is inexplicable for decisions at the UN to depend on what five permanent members at the UN Security Council have to say when there are close to 200 members at the United Nations. And in the same way, many international political and economic organizations seem to focus more on interests rather than humanitarian considerations in face of problems. And we see this encouraging threats. And this indifference vis-à-vis global problems is the most important factor which aggravates those problems. The indifferent, biased and unfair attitude based on double standards and the popular democratic movements and efforts to seek rights in the Middle East have provided oxygen, a lifeline to terrorists. Let's take a look at the world. Should we be siding with democratic regimes in the world or with autocratic regimes in the world? There are some countries where there are autocratic regimes and the people are happy with those regimes. If the people are happy, there really isn't much to say. But then there are other regimes where people are afraid and they are unable to express their view. With respect to democratic regimes, with democratic regimes, we say that we have to respect the will of the people because in democracies, we have to respect what the people want. But unfortunately, we see that in one country where the will of the people manifested itself, those who are elected with a vote of 52% are toppled by one of the ministers in the cabinet and that coup is legitimized, is accepted by the rest of the world in many countries including countries which are governed with democracy, countries which are deemed to be cradle of democracy. And that person can actually go on stage and speak at the UN General Assembly. Is the United Nations the place where people who plot coups speak or is it a platform where democratically elected people speak? Or is it a place where people from autocratic regimes come and speak? If it's a place where everybody comes to speak, then it's another story. But if I as Tahib Erdogan believe in democracy, then I would not want to be in the same picture with those people who come to power through anti-democratic means. And that's what I did at this General Assembly. Because if I do that then I will not be able to explain my position to our people because the effort, the fight for democracy is no ordinary fight. And the people who believe that they are subjected to injustice, people who are poor and desperate, they are also exploited by terrorists and terrorist organizations. And as Turkey we have been attracting attention to this unsustainable situation and we have been saying that terrorism, Islamophobia are all significant global problems and that local issues are also becoming global problems. And that's why we have been trying to call on people to unite vis-à-vis these problems. The number of people who have been killed by the regime in Damascus is close to 250,000. And the people who have been displaced are close to 10 million. In Turkey alone there are close to 1.5 million Syrian refugees and with the most recent flow of refugees in the last few weeks this figure has grown even further. So these are the facts on the ground. But nobody seems to say or ask how they can help Turkey because we are hosting close to 1.5 million people. So far the total amount that we have received is 150 million including support from the UNHCR. And we have spent close to 4.5 billion dollars for the refugees but nobody is really looking into this because they say they think that Turkey is doing everything anyway. And there are camps in Turkey and we also have some social ramifications because of the number of people we are hosting. And nobody else other than our country seems to be concerned about what can be done to help these people. We have been fighting terrorism for the last 32 years and now we are faced with ISIL terrorism and it's not new. It's something that is born out of Al-Qaeda. They were born in Iraq, they went to Syria and got stronger there and came back to Iraq. And at the moment they are occupying a third of the Iraqi territory. There are also other terrorist organizations in the region. And then, well, the whole world is up in arms when ISIL is there but why not when the PKK was doing what it's doing? Why wasn't there an effort to join forces to fight against the PKK as there is now to fight against ISIL? I find this very difficult to understand because if the world is based on justice then what we do has meaning but if politics does not go hand in hand with justice then it's very difficult to achieve results. We see now what is happening in our region. The tolerance to the regime, the illegitimate regime in Damascus has provided fertile ground for the emergence of this painful picture and the indifference of the United Nations and other international organizations and states have unfortunately provided oxygen, a lifeline to one of the biggest dramas in the history of mankind. And in Egypt we have seen a coup against an elected president and we have then seen people who have been killed. 5,000 people killed in a single day. Where in the modern world do we ever see anything like this happen? So these are the kinds of things, activities, massacres that these people are engaged in and then those people are accepted as speakers in world forums and the fact that the modern world remains indifferent to this situation has really hurt people's conscience in Egypt and in the countries in the region. The Palestinian drama ongoing for almost 100 years has also led to desperation for the people in the region and the process that emerged in Iraq after the toppling of the former regime did not provide order or democracy to Iraq. To the contrary, it created a major tragedy. We made friendly warnings to the regime and the administration in Baghdad but they were not taken into consideration by the Baghdad regime or by countries which are influential on Iraq and today we see a more complicated, a deeper problem as a result. Dear friends, the situation in the Middle East is unsustainable. These problems are no longer local, they have gained a global character. And we must make sure that we extinguish this fire before it hits more countries and it creates more terrorism and more fighting. The efforts and the operations within the framework of a coalition vis-à-vis the terrorist organization in Iraq and Syria is of course very important but this is not sufficient because we must also ensure that mechanisms to resolve the root causes of these problems should also be realized because airstrikes can provide only a temporary solution. They only create a temporary result and we must take urgent steps with respect to providing, for example, humanitarian aid to Syria. And in Syria there must also be an effort to establish a parliamentary system in Syria where all of the people will be represented within a constitutional framework within its territory. This is something that we cannot delay for any further. In Iraq too, reforms which will respect everyone in the country and which will ensure everyone's safety and which will also ensure everyone's equal representation should be realized. The operations, the coalition that is being formed now cannot be focused only on Iraq. It must target Iraq and Syria. And an operation which targets Iraq and Syria is important and we as Turkey will not remain outside this coalition. Why? Because we have a border which is 1,250 kilometers in length and we are also a country directly next door. So we are very much affected by what's going on in our neighboring countries. We are hosting 1.5 million people. So we have to take the necessary steps. We have to first of all ensure the security of our area of the border. And that is why we should take a no-fly zone, a step with respect to a no-fly zone. And we have to have a safe zone. And third, we have to take steps to train an equipment. These are the priorities that need to be done. These should not be conditional on one another or on other circumstances. We need to have all three because we should not be viewing the situation only from the point of view of a terrorist organization. We're also viewing the situation in the context of the regime in Syria. And in Iraq, too, we hope that the newly established government will perform well and in that way, we hope that we will not see what happened on the ground with the previous prime minister there in Iraq pulled back his armies when the terrorist organization came into his territory and left all the weapons behind. And it's those weapons that the terrorist organization has in its possession now. The international society must take more initiative in Palestine, Egypt and Libya. Why didn't it do that? The international community must help in trying to create some permanent solutions to some of the problems in the region. And why wasn't this done? Turkey has always believed that political dialogue is the most valid method with respect to resolving problems in our region. And we believe that the way to end the conflicts in some of our neighboring countries would be to establish democratic and inclusive orders and regimes which will meet the expectations of the people. One needs to have political stability in order to take some steps for economic development so that there is long-term development that helps all the people in our country. Turkey has pioneered in efforts aimed at mobilizing regional cooperation dynamics. We have taken concrete steps in order to bring together regional actors in the Balkans, the Caucasus, the Mediterranean and the Black Sea around joint projects. And we will continue to work on trying to bringing those actors together. We have worked to strengthen cooperation in all areas including in energy, transportation, trade and tourism. Turkey's long-term prosperity is only possible with an economic perspective that transcends national borders. That is why we have established high-level strategic cooperation councils with our neighboring countries and these councils are very important in terms of developing our relations with those countries and they are also a unique contribution to international diplomacy. Dear participants, Turkey has a young and qualified workforce, a dynamic and stable economy, a competitive private sector, a large domestic market, a settled fiscal discipline and growing infrastructure. And as such, it is the sixth largest economy in Europe and the 17th largest economy in the world. And Turkey is therefore a rising power. And as a result of deep-rooted reforms that Turkey has been implementing since 2002, Turkey has achieved a stable level of growth. And as a result of the strengthening of our public finances and the banking system, Turkey has been affected to a minimum from the global economic crisis that began in 2008. Turkey's economy grew by around 9% in 2010 and 2011 and as such, ranked second only to China in terms of the rate of growth in the world. And as of the end of 2013, Turkey's economy has grown by 4% despite many challenges. Our goal is to have 4% growth in Turkey in 2014 and 5% growth in 2015 and 2016. There is no doubt that this achievement is a result of our planned and regular efforts. The political stability that has been achieved in the last 12 years has created proper ground for the realization of structural reforms. The environment of trust and the stable environment which has been built as a result of these efforts have rendered issues like inflation and public deficit easier to handle and we have overcome those difficulties and the economy is much more resilient now and is functioning freely under competitive environments. In 2002, our national income was $230 billion and as of the end of 2013, our GDP is $820 billion and on the centenary of the Turkish Republic in 2023, our goal is to achieve $2 trillion. Per capita income in the same way was $3,500 in 2002 and it has tripled to $10,500 now and in 2023, we would like to increase per capita income to $25,000 which to us is achievable. We will do this, we will achieve these goals by maintaining stability, by maintaining an environment of trust and fiscal discipline and by implementing our monetary policy carefully. The credit rating agencies from time to time downgrade Turkey's status. They make some nonsensical statements saying that Turkey is stagnant or is just stable. These are not really based on scientific data. Many of these rating organizations we decided not to because we did not think those ratings to be well-founded and we wanted to work with others who work honestly and we are working with two others which we thought would work honestly but they too seem to be making political decisions when they decide Turkey is great Some countries in close to our region whose economies have collapsed are seeing their grades upgraded but Turkey and Turkey's position is seen in a very different light and is downgraded or only considered stable. What needs to be done here perhaps is to tell them to go their way and we will go our way because we did not arrive at where we are with the credit rating agencies or with the headlines of the press. We came to where we are with the support of our workers, of our farmers, of our business people and of our exporters and these are the kinds of realities which we should also remember. Dear friends, if such important organizations give or make political decisions and try to establish pressure on countries then this would mean the destruction of justice in the economic sense in the world. Turkey as of the 1st of December 2014 will take over the leadership of the G20 for one year. We are well aware of the significance of our responsibility in this regard. We are working on preparing for this effort and after the leaders summit in Brisbane we will finalize our priorities and we will share those priorities with the G20 countries and the international public opinion on the 1st of December. Members of the G20 must keep that spirit of cooperation and determination which they displayed immediately after the global crisis and now as well in order to eliminate the risks and uncertainties with regard to the global economy and new steps have to be taken in this regard in 2015 and it is very important too that the G20 countries fulfill their commitments with great determination. We will continue to follow up on the fulfillment of national commitments by countries in this respect supporting international trade as an engine of growth and promoting investments will continue to be important priorities for us. And we have determined as one of our priorities the strengthening of the multilateral trade system when we take over the presidency of the G20. We will display a strong will with respect to fighting against protectionism and with respect to trying to reduce barriers to trade and we will focus on infrastructure and investment efforts. We will emphasize the importance of investments with regard to its contribution to growth. We will also continue to work to ensure greater representation for developing countries in the global financial organizations such as the IMF. And during our tenure as leader of the G20 we will work to encourage a more balanced financing structure for the purpose of establishing a more resilient financial system. Another important point is the development of the low-income countries. One of our emphasis will be on low-income countries and supporting them in the G20 and its G20's efforts. Our efforts to reach out to other countries and stakeholders will play a significant role in our view with respect to strengthening the legitimacy of the G20. And we will continue to work with countries which are not members of the G20 and we will include in this cooperation other international organizations, non-governmental organizations, trade organizations, research centers and other non-profit organizations. And we hope through these efforts to achieve a more inclusive and more democratic G20. Dear participants, I would also like to share with you some of my views with regard to the topics of this special meeting, energy, entrepreneurship and infrastructure. Turkey neighbors countries which have three-fourths of the proven gas and oil reserves in the world and on the other side we are also next to the consumption markets in Europe. So Turkey has a very privileged position with respect to energy and security of energy supply and as such we have important responsibilities. One of Turkey's priorities is to meet its increasing energy demand in a stable manner. Turkey also aims to contribute to the security of energy supply to Europe through participation in various projects. We have developed the east-west energy corridor together with Azerbaijan and other friendly and allied countries. The Baku-Tbilisi-Jahan and the Baku-Tbilisi-Erzurum pipeline projects are two important components of this east-west energy corridor. Turkey and Azerbaijan have also developed the Trans-Anatolian natural gas pipeline project, the TANAP project. On the other hand, entrepreneurship is another area which is very important to us and which we support. Turkey has various organizations such as Koskeb which provide opportunities to entrepreneurs and we also have other institutions such as Tubitak which provide for ways of adding greater added value to economic activities and entrepreneurship and Turkey will continue to share experience in this respect with friendly and brotherly countries and our goal is to continue to grow based on, by focusing on these issues. We have taken significant strides with respect to infrastructure in the last 12 years. We built more than 17,000 kilometers of divided roads and we also built the high-speed train and we have become the sixth largest fast-train operator in Europe and eighth in the world. We have also inaugurated Marmaray project which we call the Project of the Century and this project joins Europe and Asia under the Bosphorus and we are also working on another tunnel under the Bosphorus where we will have car transportation and we continue to build airports, schools and hospitals and harbours in many places around Turkey and these efforts are ongoing as we speak. The third bridge over the Bosphorus called the Yavuz Sultan Selim Bridge is in the process of being built and it will be completed by the end of next year. With these steps that we take, we can show to the world how much progress has been achieved in Turkey. We are in the process of building an airport in Istanbul which will be number one in the world and as I mentioned we are also building the third bridge over the Bosphorus. We will have four lanes going each way on the bridge and the bridge will also have a rail system. We are also investing in communication, education and health and in order to support these investments Turkey is also taking steps with regard to further democratisation and we have initiated the peace process and this process is still ongoing. We are also fully determined to become a member of the European Union. We have introduced important democratic reforms in Turkey in the last 12 years and our goal is to introduce even more reforms in the future. Distinguished guests, dear friends, Turkey has a strong economy, a young population, natural resources and a strategic geographical location and Turkey as such is a very attractive country for investments and provides a window of opportunity opening up to the rest of the world. We defend peace and solidarity in the strongest way in our region and in the world and we are working to ensure greater prosperity in our country. And despite all the difficulties in our region, Turkey continues to grow and continues to grow with stability and there is no doubt that there may be some who may be bothered by this environment of stability and trust in Turkey and they may try to misrepresent the situation in Turkey and some are trying to disseminate that kind of information. We see some news items in the national and international media about Turkey and I would like to remind you to listen or read to those items with a pinch of salt. And in more recent months there have been in the national and international media some news items which suggested that Turkey is supporting terrorism. This was a very ugly smear campaign. We had to be cautious because 49 consulate staff were in the hands of ISIS and with a successful operation last Friday those hostages have been released. There have been some who have tried to distort our position because we were taking a very calm and very careful approach when it came to how we dealt with them during the time when we had hostages. I'm sure that those people who tried to blacken us in that process have probably lost a lot in terms of their reputation seeing our position now. And there was an example where a picture was published in a newspaper when myself and the Prime Minister were leaving a mosque in Turkey and this was depicted as a location where there were militants of ISIS and when a correction was asked they published a correction. Thankfully they have published a correction because there are times when such corrections do not even appear. Turkey is the shining star in the region, a shining star in the world and we will maintain that shine, we will make Turkey shine even brighter and Turkey's success will continue to be an important example for a very broad geography. I'd like to end here and once again thank the World Economic Forum, Professor Schwab and his team and colleagues and all participants for being here at this special meeting in Istanbul. Thank you very much. I hope that the meeting will be a successful one and I agree to all. Thank you very much. Mr. President, thank you very much for providing us with so many insights into what's happening in the world and in Turkey. I have to say you mentioned, Mr. President, that Turkey has a second highest gross rate in the world. Now myself traveling around the world I think economic progress and progress of welfare is nowhere so evident as in China and in Turkey. You see it really, it's a progress every time and every year you come back to this country. I also would like following your remarks at the end, I think the best is to have as many foreigners coming to the country to see themselves what's happening here. Now Mr. President I would like to come back to the beginning of, I have prepared many questions but you answered most of the questions but I have one question of a more general nature. Coming to the beginning of your speech, you rightly criticized our present multilateral system. It's a system, an old system for new problems. Now you rightly said also we have to have a reform of the Security Council and I think Turkey has a right to aspire for a seat in the Security Council. Now what values would you propagate inside such a situation, such a position if Turkey would, the new Turkey would play and is playing a major role on the international stage. What are the values which would drive you? Thank you very much. First of all, I had said that the world is bigger than five. I didn't really mean specifically to say that Turkey specifically should become a member of the UN Security Council. What I mean to say is that there are 193 members of the UN and every single one of that 193 could rotate and be a part of the Security Council. The rotation can be once a year, twice a year, but all countries ought to serve on that council is what I'm trying to say and all seven continents ought to be represented. In other words, it should not be a council where you have only five permanent members who never change. This is not fair because the US or Russia or China or France or the UK, the world is not a slave to any one of those countries. We have to acknowledge that. All countries have rights. People live in those countries and they have democratic rights. On the one hand, we talk about the universal declaration of human rights and democracy and then if we don't ourselves act democratically, then this would be a contradiction. I'll give you an example. In Syria, 250,000 people have been killed in Syria so far. We were in St. Petersburg last year at a summit and there was a working dinner and the discussion during the working dinner there was about chemical weapons and we were talking about the decision about chemical weapons. At that point in time, 120,000 people had died in the Syrian conflict and about 1,600 people had died due to chemical weapons out of the 120,000. I said when it was my turn to speak that 1,600 people were killed by the use of chemical weapons but 120,000 people were killed by the use of conventional weapons. I said, why would we not consider killing by the use of conventional weapons a crime but consider killing of 1,200 people by chemical weapons one? And since then, the 120,000 has become 250,000 and we see barrel bombs, missiles, tanks, aircraft, still all engaged in killing people in Syria. If the end result is death, then whatever you use to achieve that result is constitutes a crime so what that weapon is isn't really the point. Let's take a look at what's happening in Iraq. Mr. Barzani is here. Whose weapons are ISIS using or is benefitting from? Mr. Maliki left and then his army left and all the tanks, the artillery, the weapons are all there and they were all American weapons. I talked to the Americans, that's why I'm saying this very openly. It's their weapons, U.S. weapons, which were given to Iraq, which were left there which fell in the hands of ISIS. Germany is sending weapons, everybody is saying that they will send weapons but who will those weapons go to? Who knows or who can guarantee rather that the weapons that are being sent now will not fall in the hands of ISIS or Al Qaeda. We have to consider all this. The U.K. has just taken a decision in its parliament regarding terrorist activities in Iraq and it's very interesting that their decision is on Iraq only. Why not go to Syria as well? We say as Turkey that Iraq and Syria both need to be taken into consideration. You can't have just Iraq or just Syria because we have to work jointly to fight against terrorism in the region. Anything to the country will be trying to deal with the problem only in one region and it's not possible to resolve this problem only by airstrikes. That too will not be sufficient. There's a ground dimension to it and of course on that side there is the Peshmerga in the north in Iraq and the Iraqi army they have to be part of that effort in Syria too. The same must be true if there are countries in the coalition which can support such ground activity then it would render the activity stronger. What about Turkey? This week we will be talking with the relevant departments to assess the situation and we will be where we have to be on this point. We cannot remain outside this process. We cannot fool ourselves. A political leader was saying why we were staying a step behind and now the same people are saying that they would be against Turkish soldiers going there. The Turkish soldiers are on the border and what are they doing right now? They are trying to prevent people coming from Syria. Instead of trying to do it this way a safe zone would mean that we would be able to take our Syrian brothers and sisters to their territory and we should also help our Iraqi brothers and sisters and it's important to help the Iraqis fight the terrorist threat so that there is peace in Iraq. So we have to help this process so that we have peace in the region. I have to be very open Mr. Schwab. We say in Turkish that friends speak the painful truth but it may be painful but it's the truth and I have to speak the truth. Mr. President we lack certainly, it's good to speak the truth because only if we know the facts, if we are open we can address the issue. We need more international cooperation but I would like to come back to another issue. We also need more international solidarity and my question is you described the figures what you have received in order to support the 1.5 million refugees and what you have already spent in order to support their livelihoods. What can the international community do more to help you to show solidarity for those refugees? Now the international community first and foremost needs to step in when it comes to anti-terror because the no-fly zone for instance is a prerequisite. We need to start with the no-fly zone and a safe zone and as a third precondition train and equip and train and equip what does that target both in Iraq and in Syria we would like to act together and become stakeholders with those who are sincerely engaged, those who are against the regime in Syria and sincerely engaged there. Now of course we also need to make sure that these people have our support because they are the ones who are fighting against ISIL. In Iraq too, especially in northern Iraq is important because they have been in a very sincere fight and we believe train and equip should also address them. Furthermore more centrally the Iraqi army needs to receive our support. They need to be strengthened because they have a role to play. We can't exclude the Iraqi army. All together the steps that we shall take jointly will be very helpful. For instance most people who fled Mosul are now in our bill. They'll go back but when will they be able to go back when the terror organization leaves the place? Before the terrorist organization leaves the place these people can't return to Mosul because they risk their lives. Same in other provinces. All these areas need to be cleared because one-third of these areas are under occupation and while we take these steps the world needs to acknowledge the facts. For instance at the Security Council meeting at the UN Mr. Obama said that 104 countries support the coalition and I think the number must have reached higher levels. If we're going to go above 104 even if we remain at 104 this is a considerable number. The solidarity that we shall show will certainly provide an impetus to this fight, to this struggle and in fact we need to show solidarity. We can't remain outside this scheme. You always said one thing, to fight against terrorism requires a joint effort by all countries in the world. You can't say one country should fight against it or another. No country can say my terrorist is good and yours is bad. All terrorists by definition are bad. They're all terrorists and the fight against them needs to be a joint battle. You mentioned in your speech the lack of indifference and we all become indifferent and I think it's not only governments, it's all of us who have to overcome this indifference if we want to provide a better world to the next generation. Now before closing the session we have with us one person whose country has also been very exposed in fighting terrorism. I'm speaking of Prime Minister Mara for Mali. Since you cannot be with us tomorrow Prime Minister would you share with you your own feelings of how to combat terrorism? Thank you, Professor Schwab. President, distinguished President Erdogan, distinguished President of the Republic and esteemed heads of governments. I would like to first of all thank the World Economic Forum for providing us the opportunity to be able to have an exchange of an experience. It was a difficult experience of ours in our country and today we're all faced with global challenges and President Erdogan has mentioned something in his speech. He said that the issue of terrorism is a global problem and this requires a global response and Mali, our country, is at the heart of the side region in Africa and we share this space with a dozen other countries which are more or less affected by this problem. Today in the northern part of our country you have certain terrorist groups emanating from countries that are further away, the north of Nigeria, Middle East, sometimes Libya, and sometimes even terrorists coming from European countries. So this is to say that this is a question which requires to take an important place at the heart of the agenda. I'd like to repeat something. I think that this framework allows me, gives me the opportunity to say the following. No one has their own terrorists. This is a cancer that needs to be treated by the whole world, the whole planet. We also have climate change. We've been going through these challenges for 40 years, five years. Some terror threats have been there for 10 years or maybe a couple of decades. So this question requires an attention that goes beyond the frontiers of countries. In my view, the threat of terrorism brings about religion and the way in which it's being used in the wrong way. The religion of Islam is a religion of peace. It should not be used as a tool for war. The nations of Islam must hold each other's hand and none of the Muslim nations should either directly or indirectly be supporting terrorist activity or they should not be a part of it. And we, the Muslim nations, we do have that responsibility and we should make sure that our religion is understood, is well managed and well displayed so that the whole world knows that this religion, which is a religion of peace, is the one religion of all of us. And I think that this is a major duty of Muslim nations. The fight against terrorism has been mentioned by Mr. Erdogan. It is not just an issue of war or it's not only about arming people. It's also about international justice because there are frustrations and these frustrations feed terrorists the world must be more just and there should be a greater equality and the countries must have greater cooperation with the private sector so that there can be a greater economic development because usually it is the poverty and the delicate nature of these states that create a platform for terrorism. And we've had a discussion within the forum and we've talked about the fact that we needed to take initiatives and we need to establish a cooperation between nations and with the private investors and we need to have huge development initiatives and investments so that the poor regions where unfortunately terrorists take roots can prosper. So it is my duty on behalf of Mali to devote myself to these. Ibrahim Bokarketa is the president of Mali. He joins me and we have hope so that this forum can open up a new space a new period of cooperation between nations in a ferocious way, in a robust way but it should also open economic cooperation perspectives so that we can fight in a much more efficient way with poverty. This is what I wanted to share with the audience. Thank you. Thank you, dear prime minister. You have now a mandate of five years. If I look forward five years what is your most ardent wish? Which you would see fulfilled at the end of these five years. First of all, you know about our 2023 targets 2023 targets. As you know, the party I led as a prime minister always emphasise the importance of these targets and it's not something that I can leave behind as the president now. I will always be aware of my role and I will be there to support the government because the 2023 targets are not only the targets of a political party they are also my targets as the president of the country and I'll continue to fight so that we achieve these targets. Another important challenge, especially for the region is to overcome the current difficulties. And I can say Turkey has an important role to play in this region which means that we will and we will need to take steps together with some other countries. We can't really leave the northern neighbours of Turkey aside while we talk about the developments in the south, Russia and the Ukraine. We have a high level strategic council agreement with Russia and that is why we need to have a different way of dealing with the matters. On the other side we have Iran. Up until now we believe Iran needs to revise its policy and its approach to Syria. We will be saying this similarly for China. We also believe that China needs to revise its attitude and develop a totally different outlook to the region. On the other hand there's the Baku Tbilisi, Jeyhan, the Baku Tbilisi cars, Baku Tbilisi, Erzurum pipelines and then TANAP, the Trans-Anatolian pipeline. All these investments have a global dimension. We will be following them up very closely. Furthermore, I've been saying right from the start that education is crucial. Turkey must succeed in education and we need to succeed and turn it into a very qualified education system. Health is another priority. We want to carry this forward and thirdly, energy. Energy is a determining, a shaping factor in the world. We need to succeed in the energy sector especially with renewables. There are of course a number of other targets and I'll be keen to follow them up. One other important point is the EU accession process. Some of the targets, some of the ends that have been delayed until now will be followed up so that they can turn into reality. My Prime Minister, a brother from Mali, mentioned one aspect that is dear to my heart. They have paid a serious price for terrorism. Central Africa, similarly. It keeps paying a high price for terrorism and I've told my Prime Minister the same thing. I said to him, work on domestic issues, concentrate on domestic issues. I, with my team, will work on the international dimension. I'll be going around the world. I'll be going to Central Asia, to Africa, to European countries. I'll be going to the Latin American countries and all together, by cooperating, we'll be able to make sure that the world together fights against poverty. It's no longer sustainable to live on the misery of the poor. We should make sure that the world becomes one where the right makes might and not the other way around. We thank you for this very comprehensive tour d'horizon of what has to be done in global politics and global economics. We trust into your leadership and we wish you for the next, for the mandate, for this mandate, all the best that you can rely on the World Economic Forum, particularly also in your chairmanship of the G20. You can rely on the World Economic Forum to provide support wherever it can. Thank you very much.