WORLD ECONOMIC FORUM KICKS OFF IN ISTANBUL

"Turkey will have completely written off its debt to the IMF by April 2013" Erdoğan said. In his opening speech at Middle East, North Africa and Eurasia World Economic Forum, Prime Minister Erdoğan said that Turkey is going through a period that sets an example to all countries in the region and the Turkish economy has grown by 5.3% on average in the past 10 years. Stressing that this 5.3% growth on average is significant success taking into consideration the global economic crisis during these ten years, Erdoğan said that in 2011 Turkey was the world's biggest growing country after China and its economy grew by 8.5%.

The Forum held at Swiss Hotel is attended by Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, Deputy Prime Minister Ali Babacan, Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu, Economy Minister Zafer Çağlayan, Finance Minister Mehmet Şimşek, Energy and Natural Resources Minister Taner Yıldız and European Union Minister Egemen Bağış. The World Economic Forum Middle East, North Africa and Eurasia Summit that will last two days is the first one that covers such a wide geographical area in its 42 year history since it was founded in Geneva in 1971.

A total of 1.100 participants from 70 countries have registered for the Istanbul meeting of the World Economic Forum. About 50 government representatives at the highest level from 20 countries including Azerbaijan, Georgia and Tunisia are taking part in the meeting. The two day sessions will be attended by 650 representatives of the business world ,180 senior officials as well as 80 young global leaders from 70 countries.