Atatürk praise by Ethiopian PM overlooked by Erdoğan translator

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s translator skipped over a statement by Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed praising Turkey’s founder Mustafa Kemal Atatürk during a visit to Ankara on Wednesday, the Diken news website reported.

Ahmed referred to Atatürk as a "great reformist and charismatic leader" during a statement at a joint press conference with Erdoğan. But the translator overlooked the comments.

Erdoğan and Ahmed discussed enhancing bilateral ties along with regional and international developments during the visit, the Turkish president’s office said.

“It is free to praise the terrorist organisation Taliban, but it is forbidden to praise Atatürk,” Tuncay Özkan, a parliamentarian for Turkey’s main opposition Republican People's Party’s (CHP), said on Twitter.

Atatürk sought to turn Turkey into a modern state based on Western ideas following the country’s war of independence from occupying powers during the 1920s. Erdoğan says he respects Atatürk’s legacy but his Islamist-leaning domestic policies and Ottoman-style ambitions for Turkey have often jarred with those principles.