Turkish premier receives honorary doctorate from Russian diplomacy institute

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Wednesday received an honorary doctorate title from the Moscow State Diplomacy Institute at a ceremony in the Russian capital as part of his formal visit to the country, Anadolu News Agency reported.

After the ceremony, Erdogan addressed students, saying he was proud and excited to receive the title. He added the Moscow institute had been a keystone in determining the Russian foreign policy for years.

Erdogan said he visited Russia to participate in a meeting of the Russia-Turkey High Level Cooperation Council, adding that he was set to co-chair the meeting on Wednesday together with Russian President Dmitry Medvedev.

The Turkish premier said Turkey was one of the countries to best understand Russia's sufferings from terrorism, adding that Turkey had also been fighting against terror for the last 30 years.

"I would like reiterate that Turkey strongly condemns a terrorist attack that targeted Moscow March last year and and another one last February. Like in Russia, terrorist acts had targeted Turkey without discriminating the women, children or the elderly. But taking results by resorting to violence is an impossible task to achieve," Erdogan said.

Erdogan also rejected associating terrorism with any religion, saying such an attempt would be "a severe mistake."

"Let me put it frankly: Terrorism is just terrorism. Associating it with Christianity, Judaism of Islam would be gravely misleading. We know that the three major religions uphold human and human life as sacred [...] And there can be no such thing as Islamic terror," Erdogan said.


/Trend/