"We are not caretakers, we are the owners of those lands," President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said on Sunday as he visited the venue of celebrations for the anniversary of a decisive Turkish victory that paved the way for Turkish rule for centuries to come in Anatolia.
Erdoğan was in the town of Ahlat in southeastern Türkiye for a series of events to mark the 953rd anniversary of the Battle of Manzikert (Malazgirt) between the Seljuk army and Byzantine forces. Ahlat was where the Turkish army set out to confront the Eastern Roman Empire on the Malazgirt plain in present-day Muş province. The victory of the Sultan Alparslan-led army cemented Seljuk presence in modern-day Türkiye and started further incursion into western Anatolia. The Ottoman Empire built upon the Seljuk legacy and captured entire Anatolia where they ruled for centuries.
Erdoğan, who heads the Republic of Türkiye, a successor to the Ottomans, said Ahlat reminded them who they are and where they are now. "Seeds of brotherhood and solidarity our ancestors sowed in Anatolia grew so much that no force managed to disrupt this unity," the president told a crowd gathered for the event.
The president paid tribute to Alparslan and his soldiers and described Ahlat as a bridge to today from about 1,000 years ago.
The president, who is scheduled to chair his first Cabinet meeting in years outside the capital Ankara in Ahlat, said Türkiye faced attempts to separate its people "through ethnicity." "They wanted to separate us, they wanted to incite strife through differences in political views. With separatist terrorist groups, they tried to build walls of hatred between us," Erdoğan said in his speech. Ahlat lies in a region where the PKK carried out a campaign of violence under the pretext of fighting for a self-ruled Kurdish state. "We overcame it and we are more united than ever. Our brotherhood is not shaped by sectarian and ethnic differences. It is shaped by a common destiny, common faith, common past and common future. We are together, one heart," Erdoğan said.
The president is scheduled to visit Muş on Monday for further celebrations of the Seljuk victory.