Family planning and contraception are not for Muslim families, the Turkish president has said, in his latest comments promoting population growth that angered women's activists. Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on Monday it was the responsibility of mothers to ensure the continued growth of Turkey's population, which has expanded at a rate of around 1.3 percent in the last few years.
"I will say it clearly... We need to increase the number of our descendants," he said in a speech in Istanbul. "People talk about birth control, about family planning. No Muslim family can understand and accept that! "As God and as the great prophet said, we will go this way. And in this respect the first duty belongs to mothers." Mr Erdogan and his wife Emine have two sons and two daughters. Earlier this month, the president attended the high-profile marriage of his younger daughter Sumeyye to defence industrialist Selcuk Bayraktar.
