(Ahlul Bayt News Agency) - "Now the West starts to say democracy is not the ballot box or not only the box but we know that the ballot box is the people’s will," Erdogan said Aug 20 at an expanded meeting of the provincial chairs of his ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP), Hurriyet Daily News reported.
The prime minister criticized western countries' stance vis-à-vis Egypt’s coup, saying, "The West should (understand) the description of democracy, they need to learn it."
"This is what has been implemented in Egypt. Who is behind this? Israel. We have evidence," the prime minister said, citing a meeting between an intellectual and the justice minister in France before the 2011 elections.
Erdogan said the intellectual was Jewish. "‘The Muslim Brotherhood will not be in power even if they win the elections. Because democracy is not the ballot box’: This is what he said at that time," Erdogan said.
"Nobody can say the word 'dictator' where dictatorship exists. They hang (such people) as they do in Egypt," Erdogan said. "Those who want to see a dictator must look at Egypt".
Erdogan also criticized Persian Gulf countries that have provided financial aid to Egypt's military government, asking them whether they had ever given such support to the African Muslim countries.
"We know that there are rich people in the Islamic world, but we also know that there are poor people in need of alms. It is those rich of the Islamic world who have supported dictators," he said.
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