Mustafa Kemal Ataturk was a remarkable soldier-statesman, combining outstanding ability as a military leader with a clear understanding of the challenge of making Turkey a modern nation.
I like to recall a particular phrase of his which demonstrates the true leader: "I don't act for public opinion, I act for the nation".
And he did indeed act with energy and with vision to change the whole course of Turkey's destiny.
Ataturk also once remarked: "For centuries, the Turks have always walked from the East in the direction of the West" expressing with those words an ambition to see Turkey firmly anchored in the Western world and a full partner in its institutions.
That ambition is being steadily fulfilled: and I was able to see for myself, when I visited Turkey earlier this year the tremendous advances which have been made over the fifty years since Ataturk's death.
I am proud to be among those paying tribute to those achievements in this special programme, as well as the memory of an exceptionally great man.