Turkey's Erdogan hails Ataturk on death anniversary

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Thursday hailed the founder of modern Turkey Mustafa Kemal Ataturk on the 78th anniversary of his death but added the country's influence should go well beyond the borders of the state he created. Ataturk, who died on November 10, 1938, founded Turkey as a secular republic in 1923 out of the ruins of the Ottoman Empire and defeat in World War I. Thousands of people meanwhile thronged Ataturk's Anitkabir mausoleum in Ankara -- where he was laid to rest after dyin