The prime minister was speaking to the press as he received the gold-medal winners of this summer's Paralympics.

" Turkey has been fighting separatist terrorism for a quarter of a century. The terrorist organization, which knows no human values, destroys our people's lives, wealth, peace and our unity. No one should forget that before anything else. There is no place for weakness or hesitation in this fight. No one should even try to show our security forces as being weak or hesitant. We have lost some of our youngest sons to this. We have sacrificed our women, children and elderly. We have been hurt, and we still hurt."

He also said fighting terrorism was a nationwide struggle that should be fought in solidarity and unity.

Meanwhile, Prime Minister Erdoğan is set to visit five of the eastern and southern provinces for the first time since the terrorist attack in Aktütün, Hakkari, on Oct. 3 that left 17 soldiers dead. The first stop will be Elazığ this Saturday, where he will participate in a number of events including his party's local congresses. Later on Sunday, he will be in Kahramanmaraş. On Monday he will visit Diyarbakır, where he will attend start of academic year ceremonies at Dicle University. He will be in Ankara briefly until Friday, but will return to the East again on Friday and visit Tunceli. On Saturday, he will visit Hakkari, the site of the Aktütün attack, which was also the scene of another attack that killed five more soldiers only yesterday.