Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan today unveiled a new presidential palace on the outskirts of Ankara, denounced by ecologists as an environmental blight and by the opposition as evidence of his autocratic tendencies.
Erdogan hosted his first official event at the new palace, a ceremony congratulating dignitaries on the annual republic day marking the foundation of modern Turkey in 1923 out of the ruins of the Ottoman Empire.
The complex, located in the Bestepe (Five Hills) area, has become known as the Ak Saray -- the White Palace.
An immense project -- built at a reported cost of $350 million -- has an area of 200,000 square metres (21,50,000 square feet), 1,000 rooms and architecture that is supposed to marry modernism and the traditions of the mediaeval Seljuk dynasty.
Erdogan cancelled an evening reception that was to be held Wednesday evening at the palace because of a mining disaster in the southern Karaman province that has left 18 miners trapped.
"It would not be appropriate to hold this reception at such a time," Erdogan told reporters in televised comments inside the palace, before heading to the scene of the disaster.
According to Turkish media reports, invitations for the reception had been sent out to 2,500 couples.
The palace will become the new home of the Turkish presidency, marking an historic break with the Cankaya presidential palace in downtown Ankara.
The Cankaya has been the seat of the Turkish president ever since the modern republic's founder Mustafa Kemal Ataturk became president and for many has been a symbol of Turkey's modern history as a progressive secular state.
From Ataturk to Erdogan, it has been the home of 12 Turkish presidents.
The move to the new palace is a vivid symbol of what Erdogan touts as his drive towards a "new Turkey".
But for the opposition, the new palace marks another betrayal by Erdogan of Turkey's secular heritage bequeathed by Ataturk who based the republic on a strict separation of religion and state.
