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Ankara: Moves by Turkey's chief prosecutor to ban the Islamist-rooted ruling party and bar the president and prime minister from politics were "an attack on the will of the nation", premier Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on Saturday.
"The action taken on Saturday is not aimed at the Justice and Development Party but the will of the nation," he told a party meeting in the southeastern town of Siit, which was broadcast on television.
Erdogan was reacting publicly for the first time to the formal decision of Abdurrahman Yalcinkaya, chief prosecutor of the court of appeals, to ask the Constitutional Court to ban Erdogan's AKP party.
Erdogan, noting that 16.5 million people had voted for the AKP in elections in July, added, "No one can say that these people are a focal point of anti-secular activities."
Attacking Yalcinkaya, he warned, "those responsible for such shame and injustice will suffer the consequences of this irresponsible recourse".
Erdogan said the AKP, which emerged in 2001 from a banned Islamist party, was fighting for democracy, and stressed its economic achievements since 2002.
The court will meet on Monday to decide whether to accept the complaint, which charges that the AKP has become a focal point for attempts to overturn the strictly secular ethos that underlies Turkey's constitution.
Kurdish plan
Erdogan on Saturday unveiled a series of economic and cultural plans to enhance lives of people in the country's mainly Kurdish and poor southeast region.
Erdogan said up to $12 billion (Dh44 billion) will be spent within the next five years to improve agriculture in the mostly rural area and a multi-language television channel will be launched shortly.
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