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• n  an advocate of secularism; someone who believes that religion should be excluded from government and education

• Despite secularist fears of its Islamist roots, Erdogan's party gets even more support than it did five years ago.
• Just a few hours after the arrests, Turkey's top court another secularist stronghold convened to deliberate on the case for banning the AKP and its senior politicians .
• But the hard-line secularist Republican People's Party, or CHP, reacted harshly.

News & Articles

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• India needs Patel’s secularism, not votebank secularism: Modi
  KEVADIA, Gujarat: Invoking Sardar Patel’s secularist legacy, Narendra Modi today launched a frontal attack on Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, saying the country needed secularism of the kind followed by the ‘Iron Man’ and not the one that was linked to votebank politics.
  Nov. 1, 2013 - INDOlink
• Four Turkish MPs attend parliament in head scarves, first time in 15 years
  By Gulsen Solaker and Jonathon Burch ANKARA (Reuters) - Four female lawmakers from Turkey's Islamist-rooted ruling party wore Islamic head scarves in parliament on Thursday in a challenge to the country's secular tradition. Fellow Justice and Development Party (AKP) lawmakers kissed and hugged the women as they took their seats in the general assembly. Secularist opponents made only subdued ...
  Oct. 31, 2013 - Reuters via Yahoo! News

Quotes

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• Chuck Norris in Evening Bulletin
  I'm not asking them to join Hamas, the Islamic Jihad or al-Qaida, but rather, I'm asking them to return to Islam, in order to fight for the establishment of an Islamic state over all of Palestine and not for the establishment of a secularist state... Ayman al-Zawahri http://www.google.com/url?q=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ayman_al-Zawahiri&source=dictionary&usg=AFQjCNGp2d1aD_OAkqFy6Goz78P-J9RUeA Sun-Sentinel.com http://www.google.com/url?q=http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/nationworld/sns-ap-zawahri-tape,0,4705267.story%3Fcoll%3Dsns-newsnation-headlines&source=dictionary&usg=AFQjCNETSuhAifVKroVt1CjR5Fe3gkUoCQ Nov 29, 2004 87397 116849 secularist Mike doesn't abandon his values for what's expedient. Like our Founding Fathers, he's not afraid to stand up for a Creator and against secularist beliefs," stated Mr. Norris, also known as Walker, Texas Ranger.
• Recep Tayyip Erdogan in Daily Times
  The principle of secularism was enshrined in the constitution by the will of our parliament and the support of our nation ...... and today a majority of our people back [a] secularist system of state,Erdogan told a gathering of his party.