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TURKEY WANTS 'ISTANBUL' MOSQUE IN CUBA: ERDOGAN
Agence France Presse
February 12, 2015 Thursday 10:15 AM GMT
Istanbul, Feb 12 2015
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan unveiled his ambitious plan
to build a major Ottoman-style mosque in Cuba, saying it should be
similar to a nineteenth century one on the Bosphorus in Istanbul,
the presidency said Thursday.
Erdogan acknowledged after holding talks with Cuban President Raul
Castro in Havana that Cuban officials had appeared to have already
made an agreement with Saudi Arabia for the construction of a mosque
in Havana.
But Erdogan, who caused astonishment last year by claiming Muslims
discovered the Americas before Columbus, said Turkey was pressing
for an Ottoman-style mosque in another city in Cuba.
"We have told them that we could build a similar one to Ortakoy
Mosque in another city, if you have promised to others for Havana,"
Erdogan said in the communist island, the second stop of his Latin
America tour.
The Ortakoy Mosque, designed by the Balyan family of Armenian
architects, was built in 1853 during the rule of the Ottoman sultan
Abdulmecid I.
The neo-Baroque edifice is a familiar sight on the shore near the
Bosphorus Bridge.
Erdogan said Turkey was not in search of a partner to build the mosque
as "our architecture is different from that of Saudi Arabia."
"I have provided the Cuban officials with all the necessary
information.... so far they have not taken a negative approach to it,"
he was quoted as saying by the presidential website.
Erdogan, a pious Muslim who has been in power for more than a decade,
stirred controversy late last year by declaring that the Americas
were discovered by Muslims in the 12th century, nearly three centuries
before Christopher Columbus sailed across the Atlantic.
Erdogan cited as evidence for his claim that "Columbus mentioned the
existence of a mosque on a hill on the Cuban coast" and offered to
build a mosque at the site mentioned by the Genoese explorer.
The president has repeatedly been ridiculed by critics for harking
back to Turkey's past to even before the Ottoman Empire was established
in the fourteenth century.
Agence France Presse
February 12, 2015 Thursday 10:15 AM GMT
Istanbul, Feb 12 2015
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan unveiled his ambitious plan
to build a major Ottoman-style mosque in Cuba, saying it should be
similar to a nineteenth century one on the Bosphorus in Istanbul,
the presidency said Thursday.
Erdogan acknowledged after holding talks with Cuban President Raul
Castro in Havana that Cuban officials had appeared to have already
made an agreement with Saudi Arabia for the construction of a mosque
in Havana.
But Erdogan, who caused astonishment last year by claiming Muslims
discovered the Americas before Columbus, said Turkey was pressing
for an Ottoman-style mosque in another city in Cuba.
"We have told them that we could build a similar one to Ortakoy
Mosque in another city, if you have promised to others for Havana,"
Erdogan said in the communist island, the second stop of his Latin
America tour.
The Ortakoy Mosque, designed by the Balyan family of Armenian
architects, was built in 1853 during the rule of the Ottoman sultan
Abdulmecid I.
The neo-Baroque edifice is a familiar sight on the shore near the
Bosphorus Bridge.
Erdogan said Turkey was not in search of a partner to build the mosque
as "our architecture is different from that of Saudi Arabia."
"I have provided the Cuban officials with all the necessary
information.... so far they have not taken a negative approach to it,"
he was quoted as saying by the presidential website.
Erdogan, a pious Muslim who has been in power for more than a decade,
stirred controversy late last year by declaring that the Americas
were discovered by Muslims in the 12th century, nearly three centuries
before Christopher Columbus sailed across the Atlantic.
Erdogan cited as evidence for his claim that "Columbus mentioned the
existence of a mosque on a hill on the Cuban coast" and offered to
build a mosque at the site mentioned by the Genoese explorer.
The president has repeatedly been ridiculed by critics for harking
back to Turkey's past to even before the Ottoman Empire was established
in the fourteenth century.