Underscoring that there is no gender discrimination in the Turkish people's cultural background, President Erdoğan said: "Grave sufferings, violations, and abuses lie behind the huge debates in the West on human rights, women's rights, children's rights and even on animal rights."

President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and First Lady Emine Erdoğan attended the 3^rd International Women and Justice Summit, held in Istanbul by Women and Democracy Association with the theme of "Family Empowerment".

Delivering a speech at the event, President Erdoğan said: "I hope the 3^rd International Women and Justice Summit will lead to auspicious outcomes for our country our people, the women, and all humanity."

Praising the summit's theme "Family Empowerment", President Erdoğan said: "Woman is both an inseparable part and the engine of the family. In our culture and faith, family is an essential establishment, which is formed and lives under the joint responsibility of man and woman."

Underlining that both man and woman contribute to, depending on the circumstances, to the division of tasks within the family, President Erdoğan said: "A mentality which isolates women from working life and men from domestic life undermines the family concept."

"Grave sufferings, violations, and abuses lie behind the huge debates in the West on human rights, women's rights, children's rights and even on animal rights. The more drastic the breakdown is, the bigger the debates and steps taken in that direction get. You cannot find such painful breakdowns in our history. Neither our faith nor our culture would allow that," said President Erdoğan.

Highlighting the efforts to make sure women, children, the elderly, the people with disabilities and the disadvantaged assume the positions they deserve in the society, President Erdoğan said: "In our era, the female labor force participation rate has risen from 28 % up to 38 % and female employment rate from 21 % to 30 %. Our 9 million 122 thousand women in working life have further strengthened our country and made us proud with their production and success. We not only have provided them justice in working life but also punished in the severest way all kinds of violence against women."