Reuters, one the world’s most eminent news agencies, has published the full text of the interview with Adnan Oktar by Tom Heneghan, the agency’s senior, Paris based, religious correspondent. In addition to the text of the interview, the report, dated 19 June, 2008, and titled “Harun Yahya preaches Islam, slams Darwin and awaits Jesus," went on to say:
In the two years I’ve been writing about the Turkish Muslim creationist Harun Yahya, we’ve had to use adjectives like “reclusive” or “mysterious” to describe Adnan Oktar (his real name). The head of one of the Muslim world’s biggest publishing outfits rarely talked to the media. But he has begun speaking out more in public recently. We took the opportunity to interview him and here is my feature — Muslim creationist preaches Islam and awaits Christ. …You can read the transcript of the interview here.
What was interesting, though, was the way he explained the Atlas campaign as part of his Muslim vision of the end times. Several Turks have told me they suspect he considers himself the Mahdi, the Muslim saviour who comes at the end of time to fight with Jesus against evil and establish Islam as the only world religion. He denied this… Whatever it is, he sees some role for himself in the end times, which he said will come in the next 20 to 25 years.
