Nevruz to be celebrated on March 21! President Erdoğan will also attend

AK Party Spokesperson Ömer Çelik made statements regarding his party's Central Executive Board (MKYK) agenda. Stating that President and AKP Chairman Recep Tayyip Erdoğan will also attend the Nevruz celebrations to be held on March 21, Çelik said, 'It will be celebrated as an ancient commemoration.' Here are the key highlights from Çelik's speech:

WE WILL CELEBRATE NEVRUZ

"We celebrate Nevruz everywhere from the Turkic World to the Balkans as the harbinger of spring. In this context, we will hold a program at the Haliç Congress Center on March 21 with the participation of our President. In this period of chaos, Nevruz will be celebrated as an ancient commemoration in terms of the message of brotherhood to this entire region.

TRUMP ADMINISTRATION AND EU TENSION

When we look at the debate between Trump and EU leaders, we see in practice that the order established after World War II has ended. The world is in search of a new order. In this context, the roadmap that the world's new actors will follow is the most important issue. Here, Turkey maintains its role as a key country at the center of all developments. Today, EU leaders are making a number of criticisms regarding Trump's actions, both in terms of law and principles. The issues they criticize today are a summary of their own behavior toward Turkey. If you put the EU leaders' criticisms regarding foreign policy one after another, the total that emerges will be a complete summary of the double-standard policy toward Turkey. Turkey will continue to play a key role.

"TURKEY CANNOT BE HANDLED BY THE EU ONLY THROUGH SECURITY ISSUES"

Many discussions are taking place regarding the needs of the European security architecture. We see that numerous articles are being published and political statements are being made about how indispensable Turkey is. Our message is this: Turkey cannot be handled only through security issues. You need to evaluate it in terms of economic prosperity and the sharing of social values. In this respect, it is time for them to face the double standard they have placed before Turkey regarding the EU membership process for years. They are even hesitant to open chapters. We hope that they will not handle the discussion that has started on this occasion solely on the basis of security, and that they will come before Turkey with a framework that does not forget the dimension that Turkey is a strong European state. Then it will be seen by everyone that brand new windows of opportunity have emerged for the region, world peace, and the European security architecture.

LATEST DEVELOPMENTS IN SYRIA

We are following the agenda in Syria closely. Days ago, some incidents occurred following an attack by groups affiliated with Assad against the legitimate administration. There were clashes. Unfortunately, we saw that circles trying to trigger chaos in various ways also took action. There were attacks on our Alawite and Nusayri brothers, and there were those who lost their lives. We express that we condemn these attacks. The Syrian administration has also established a commission to uncover the attackers. From the moment the incident occurred, we said that armed groups, which we know as remnants of Assad, carried out an armed attack against the legitimate administration. While responding to this, we also condemn the targeting of civilians by certain groups and individuals. One should not deviate from the line of representing all of Syria, regardless of whether they are Sunni, Shia, Alawite, Nusayri, Druze, Turkmen, Kurdish, or Arab. Assad's massacres cannot be attributed to Alawites, the YPG's massacres to Kurds, or DAESH's massacres to Arabs in Syria. They signed a big lie as if Turkey was protecting this behind the massacres. They tried to gain political leverage from this. What they are doing is extremely primitive and vulgar. Especially, someone's call for international intervention serves nothing other than dragging Syria into a new chaos. Those we call remnants of Assad are terrorists who carried out this attack by acting as proxy forces for certain states and armed groups there.

"AGREEMENT TEXT BETWEEN AZERBAIJAN AND ARMENIA IS GRATIFYING, MINSK GROUP SHOULD NOW BE REMOVED FROM THE PROCESS"

It was announced that an agreement has been reached on the text in peace negotiations between Azerbaijan and Armenia, which is a gratifying development. This stage is important in terms of the Caucasus vision. From now on, it will also be important for Armenia to change certain laws or constitutional articles that target Azerbaijan. The time has come for the OSCE Minsk Group, which was actually established to solve the problem for years, to be removed from the process. They no longer have a mission. They have not contributed to the solution. Once these are done, the Turkey-Armenia normalization process will also gain momentum.

TERROR-FREE TURKEY PROCESS: WHAT WAS DISCUSSED IN THE AK PARTY-DEM MEETING?

Our focus is on the PKK laying down its arms and dissolving itself. Efkan Bey and I were involved in previous processes as well. At the point reached today, Mr. Devlet Bahçeli's historic call and our President's will have opened an important window of opportunity. We do not have an approach of compromising on the nation's values. Bargaining is not on our agenda.