Turkey remains a second class country for the West, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said at a business forum in Istanbul on Wednesday, RIA Novosti reports.

“No matter what progress we achieve, in the eyes of the West we always remain a second class country. We realized this bitter truth in the process of Turkey’s integration to the EU, which lasts for half a century,” he said, Anadolu reports.

In Erdoğan’s words, many people in the West associate the East with primitive customs and narrow outlook.

“The scale of values of the East, which is the cradle of the majority of civilizations, has no place for such a treatment. Some representatives of the West ruthlessly claim that it is necessary to review the negotiation process between Turkey and EU. I think they are even late with this call. Review this process faster, but don’t stop on this and take a final decision,” he noted.