By Sasha Pei-Silovo – EM TV Online
President of Turkey, Recep Tayyip Erdogan has yet again caused global outcry over his latest controversial remarks, this time against women and gender equality.
At a period where the world is focused on recognising the rights of women, Mr Erdogan has come out to say that women cannot be treated as equals to men.
“You cannot put women and men on an equal footing. It is against nature.
“In the workplace, you cannot treat a man and a pregnant woman in the same way,” Mr Erdogan said, as reported by the Anatolia news agency.
He further claimed that it was against the delicate nature of women to do men’s work and said equality was not what women needed, but rather respect.
Erdogan went on to say that the solution to most of the issues faced by the world was ‘justice’; issues to which he stated as being racism, anti-Semitism and “women’s problems”.
The president’s latest remarks were made in Istanbul, the largest and most populous Turkish city, at a women’s conference.
He went on to lash out at feminists, emphasising the significance of motherhood in the Islam religion; according to Erdogan, feminists failed to grasp its importance and rejected motherhood.
The Turkish president is known to cause controversy, with his outbursts and public statements; more recently claiming that three hundred years ago, it was the Muslims who discovered the Americas and not the famed explorer Christopher Columbus.
On previous occasions, the president fulminated against the birth of newborn babies by Caesarean section.
Credit: Anatolia news agency and BBC News
