ANKARA
Delivering a speech at his party's parliamentary group meeting, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said that local elections would be held in March 2014 as earlier scheduled.
Regarding the international credit rating agency Fitch's raising Turkey to investment grade, Erdogan said that it was an important development, but Turkey's credit rating was lower than it should actually be.
Erdogan said that there was need for a restructuring in international credit rating agencies.
Fitch raised Turkey to BBB- and said Turkey's sovereign creditworthiness had become more resilient to shocks and that the upgrade reflected "a combination of an easing in near-term macro-financial risks as the economy heads for a soft landing," as well as "a moderate and declining government debt burden, a sound banking system, favourable medium-term growth prospects and a relatively wealthy and diverse economy."
Erdogan said that there have been good developments in Turkish economy, referring that Turkey's exports reached 124.8 billion U.S. dollars in the first 10 months of 2012.
