Ankara hosts Turkey-Africa media forum

ANKARA - Hürriyet Daily News

Deputy Prime Minister Bülent Arınç opened a two-day Turkey-Africa Media Forum yesterday as part of Ankara’s ongoing efforts to boost ties with the continent.

“Our people, who belong to a land where the disease of racism could never spread, see the African people as brothers and sisters. We are not like Western countries, which only do things on paper. Turkey’s institutions and humanitarian activists are traveling through every part of Africa today,” Arınç said at the gathering. The meeting brought together 270 participants from 54 African countries with Turkish journalists as well as representatives of Turkey’s Supreme Board of Radio and Television (RTÜK), Turkish Radio and Television (TRT) and the Anatolian News Agency. The uprisings in Tunisia, Libya and Egypt were clear indications of the demand for democracy in Africa, said Arınç. Turkey plans to open three more embassies in Africa by the end of the year, bringing the total number to 34, and the number of African embassies in Turkey is expected to increase from 16 to 32 in the coming years, he said.