"UNDERSTANDING AND TOLERANCE WILL CONTINUE IN TURKEY"

Minister for EU Affairs and Chief Negotiator Egemen Bagis, together with Secretary General for EU Affairs Ambassador Volkan Bozkir, met the leaders and representatives of various religious groups for working dinner held at Feriye Restaurant in Istanbul.

Fener Greek Patriarch Bartholomeos, Turkish Jews Chief Rabbi Isak Haleva, Deputy Patriarch of the Assyrian Catholic Community Yusuf Sag, Spiritual Leader of the Armenian Orthodox Community Archbishop Aram Atesyan, Assyrian Orthodox Community Metropolitan Yusuf Cetin, vice-president of the Bulgarian Orthodox Church Foundation Dimitriv Atanosav and representatives of some religious groups attended the meeting.

In his speech, Bagis said, "Within the scope of the democratic initiative and National Unity and Brotherhood Project, our determination to maintain mutual understanding and tolerance in these lands where we lived together for centuries continues and will continue in the future."

Bagis highlighted the fact that one of the important targets of the Government was to further strengthen the atmosphere of tolerance which would enable the citizens to exercise their religious believes freely. Bagis said: "We believe in the need of a process of a dialogue both to achieve this target and to be aware of the problems and needs of our society and to produce solutions to this end."

Stating that, in the light of that understanding, they were trying to embrace equally every cultural richness and every citizen in each side of Anatolia from Edirne to Mardin, Bagis reminded that workshops were being run towards Roman and Alewi citizens.

Bagis also reminded that Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan met with the representatives of religions inAugust in the previous year.

Source: AA