Speaking at a meeting at the Central Bank Administration Center, where the new Turkish banknotes and coins that will be in circulation on January 1, 2009 have been introduced, Erdogan said that "for years, the Turks were complaining about the Turkish currency's losing value."

"It would be wrong to complain about the present high value of the Turkish currency. I am proud of the fact that the Turkish currency is now valuable," Erdogan stressed.

"We are approaching the end of an operation in which we erased six zeros from the Turkish currency. As of January 1, 2009, we are returning back to our actual and highly valued Turkish Liras," Erdogan said.

"Turkey went through heavy inflation pressure in the past few decades. In 1994, the inflation figure in Turkey was 125 percent. Such an inflation had a (negative) impact on not only the economy but politics, foreign policy and social life as well," Erdogan said.

"Thanks to disciplined fiscal and money policies that our government implemented, inflation figures in the year 2004 dropped to single digits," Erdogan noted.

"We do not foresee any difficulty in getting used to the Turkish Liras. Our nation adjusted itself well to the New Turkish Liras whose use began on January 1, 2005. The New Turkish Liras banknotes would be collected from the market in a period of one year. I do not predict any difficulty in getting used to the Turkish Liras," Erdogan said.

AA