News reports have said that Erdoğan will oversee the beginning of construction of a mosque when he visits Cuba in mid-February, in line with his controversial remarks in November that Muslims discovered America first and that a mosque once sat on a hill along the Cuban coast.
“I will talk to my brothers in Cuba and a mosque would suit the top of that hill today as well. We would build it if they [the Cuban government] say so,” Erdoğan then said.
“There is no plan to lay the groundwork for a mosque during our Cuba visit. It's not in our program,” Kalın told reporters.
A Turkish delegation traveled in April to Cuba to seek permission to build a mosque in the Cuban capital of Havana. Turkish media has subsequently reported, however, that Cuban authorities rejected the request, submitted by Turkey's Religious Affairs Foundation (TDV).
Kalın was appointed presidential spokesman in December. He became the first spokesman for the Turkish presidency, as part of a restructuring in the presidential team following Erdoğan's election to the top state post in an election on Aug. 10.
At the televised press conference, Kalın also denied a news report that Turkish troops guarding the tomb of Süleyman Şah in northern Syria have been stranded there since March, unable to receive any supplies from Turkey because the tomb is surrounded by militants from the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL). The troops have been receiving water and food from ISIL, journalist Methehan Demir wrote on his blog.
Kalın dismissed the report as "speculation" and said that, despite difficulties, the needs of the soldiers are routinely met.
Today Zaman