"}President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has stirred up controversy over the treaty that almost a century ago set the borders of modern Turkey, alarming both neighbouring Greece and secular opposition at home.
In a speech Thursday, Erdogan for the first time rejected the notion that the 1923 Treaty of Lausanne was a \u201cvictory\u201d for Turkey and wistfully lamented the loss of Aegean islands which are now Greek territory.
The treaty \u2014 the founding basis of the modern Turkish state out of the ruins of the Ottoman Empire \u2014 has usually been seen inside the country as a triumph of its secular leadership led by Mustafa Kemal Ataturk.
\u201cYou see the Aegean, don\u2019t you?\u201d Erdogan told local officials in the speech at his presidential palace.
\u201cIn Lausanne, we gave away islands (so near that) your voice can be heard if you shout across to them. Is this a victory?\u201d he asked.
\u201cThey were ours. There are our mosques, our shrines there.\u201d
Erdogan rounded on those who negotiated the treaty who included Ismet Inonu, Ataturk\u2019s right-hand-man who would later succeed him as president and still a hero for secularists.
\u201cThose who sat at that table could not make the best of the agreement. Today we are suffering the consequences.\u201d
Turkey\u2019s main opposition party leader spoke out against Erdogan\u2019s comments, describing them as a betrayal of history.
\u201cDon\u2019t forget that you sit on that chair thanks to Lausanne,\u201d said Kemal Kilicdaroglu of the Republican People\u2019s Party (CHP), the party founded by Ataturk which sees itself as the guardian of his secular principles.
\u201cNobody has the right to betray their history.\u201d
Yusuf Kaplan, columnist in the pro-government Yeni Safak newspaper, however described Lausanne as a \u201cdeath warrant\u201d and praised Erdogan for throwing \u201ctaboos on the trash.\u201d
\u201cTurkey could not be invaded from outside but was captured inside by being secularised from the top by secular elites.\u201d