Addressing the First International Summit on Women and Justice held in Istanbul on Nov. 24, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said the Islamic perception of the creation does not consider men and women as being equal, although they should be treated equally under the law. “We observe that women’s struggle for their rights got stuck in their fight for equality while missing the sense of justice,” Erdogan said. “What is it that women need?”

He added, “What is right is to establish equality among women. What is right is to have equality among men. You cannot put women into men’s work like the communist regimes did in the past. … That would go against women’s delicate bodies.”

Erdogan also stressed that the Islamic faith honors motherhood and promises that heaven is beneath the feet of the mothers. “Islam did not grant that honor to fathers. I used to kiss the bottom of my mother’s feet. She used to pull them back and not permit me to do that. Yet I told her not to be irritated of it because there is the smell of heaven under her feet. She sometimes cried. Mothers are something else. Motherhood is the highest position [in humanity]. … But you cannot explain this to feminists, because they don’t accept motherhood. They don’t have such an issue. We are good with those who understand us and we continue our path with them.”

Erdogan’s remarks, however, received a strong backlash both from opposition parties and nongovernmental women's groups. Indeed, 57 women's organizations published a joint news release stressing that the constitution had granted equality between men and women since the foundation of the republic.