Turkey Crackdown Chronicle: Week of March 20
Istanbul court rules trial for journalists facing life sentences to be closed to public The Committee to Protect Journalists today condemned an Istanbul court’s decision today to bar the public from the trial of Can Dündar and Erdem Gül, journalists for the daily newspaper Cumhuriyet. Representatives from CPJ and other free-speech groups attended the first…
Turkey Crackdown Chronicle: Week of March 13
Prosecutors preparing charges against media owner, pro-government newspaper says Turkish prosecutors are preparing a case against media owner Aydın Doğan and his daughter, Hanzade Doğan Boyner, claiming they ran a fuel-smuggling ring, the pro-government daily newspaper Akşam said in a front-page story yesterday. Akşam said prosecutors were seeking a 23-year sentence against the businessman, whose…
On International Women’s Day, CPJ recognizes nine female journalists jailed for their work
Coverage of protests and riots. Revelations of official corruption and graft. Major natural disasters. Investigations into deplorable living conditions. These are some of the important issues journalists cover in their role as the Fourth Estate.
For journalists fleeing Islamic State, Turkey ‘is as dangerous as Syria’
For the past two years, activists and journalists seeking refuge from Islamic State repression in Raqqa would take sanctuary across the border in southern Turkey, setting up safe houses and offices, and darting back to Syria regularly with camera equipment and other vital supplies. But that sanctuary is now under threat.
From Charlie Hebdo in Paris to bloggers in Bangladesh, extremists target press
Thursday marks one year since two gunmen burst into the Paris offices of satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo and opened fire. Over the following year, CPJ documented the deaths of 28 journalists who were killed for their work by Islamic militant groups such as Islamic State and Al-Qaeda. This StoryMap charts the deadly attacks that took…
CPJ joins call for Turkey to release Cumhuriyet journalists
The Committee to Protect Journalists has joined an appeal alongside 13 other international advocacy groups, calling on Turkey to release Can Dündar, editor-in-chief of the Turkish pro-opposition daily Cumhuriyet, Erdem Gül, the paper’s Ankara bureau chief, and all other journalists currently imprisoned in Turkey for their work.
Report highlights Turkey’s troubled press freedom record
Turkish authorities should end impunity for attacks against journalists, decriminalize insult and defamation, stop harassing critical news outlets, and release imprisoned journalists, according to “Press Freedom in Turkey’s Inter-Election Period,” a report published Saturday by the Vienna-based International Press Institute. Muzaffar Suleymanov, CPJ’s Europe and Central Asia program researcher, contributed to the report.
Joint mission finds Turkish journalists under severe pressure
Pressure on journalists in Turkey has severely escalated since parliamentary elections on June 7, restricting the media’s ability to report on matters of public interest, according to press freedom groups who conducted a joint international emergency mission to the country this week. Ahead of fresh elections on November 1, the group said that if the…
CPJ and VICE News call on Turkey to #FreeRasool
It has been more than seven weeks since Iraqi journalist Mohammed Ismael Rasool was arrested in Turkey alongside Jake Hanrahan and Philip Pendlebury, two British journalists from VICE News. But whereas Hanrahan and Pendlebury were released a week later, Rasool is still behind bars.
Don’t Forget Rasool: In international reporting, local journalists often suffer
When two journalists from VICE, Jake Hanrahan and Philip Pendlebury, were arrested with Iraqi journalist Mohammed Ismael Rasool on August 28, a familiar scenario unfolded. A week later, Hanrahan and Pendlebury were released following a media flurry and worldwide attention. Still behind bars is Rasool, an experienced journalist and translator who had worked extensively in…