President: 'Let's be as one ... all be Turkey together'

Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan said on Monday the nation had voted for stability in a legislative election that saw the Justice and Development Party, or AKP, win almost 50 percent of the vote, and said the world should respect the result.

The AKP swept to an unexpected landslide victory on Sunday, returning Turkey to single-party rule.

"The national will manifested itself on Nov 1 in favor of stability," Erdogan said.

"Let's be as one, be brothers and all be Turkey together."

But he also attacked the global media and its criticism of him.

"Is this your understanding of democracy?" he said. "Now a party with some 50 percent in Turkey has attained power. ... This should be respected by the whole world, but I have not seen such maturity."

The AKP took just shy of 50 percent of the votes on Sunday, initial results showed, comfortably enough to control about 316 of the 550 seats in legislature and a far higher margin of victory than even party insiders had expected.

Reuters