An Istanbul court on Tuesday issued access bans to news stories and tweets about a special report Reuters published about Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s son.
A total of 93 web pages and tweets were blocked and sent take down notices upon appeal by Bilal Erdoğan, according to the court ruling. The block includes Voice of America, Euronews, MSN, and almost all independent news outlets in Turkey.
“The duty to inform necessarily includes duties and responsibilities, and limits that media organs should abide by on their own volition,” the court said, adding that the Reuters report in question “includes phrasing that alleges crimes against the applicant not based on concrete facts”.
Reuters’ Monday report detailed a Swedish company’s alleged attempt to gain a foothold in the Turkish market via the president’s son, promising to pay tens of millions of dollars in kickbacks. The report mentioned that no kickback had been paid, and that the company in question, Dignita Systems AB, had “abruptly abandoned the project late last year”.
The take down order pertains to articles reporting on Reuters’ findings, while pro-government media’s coverage of the matter remains online.
State-run Anadolu Agency reported Presidential Communications Director Fahrettin Altun’s scathing remarks on the report, not covering the report itself, and the story was picked up by other outlets including Daily Sabah and Yeni Şafak English.
Yeni Şafak owner Albayrak Media said it was ending its contract with Reuters over the incident.
Altun had called the report “a black mark against and a pitiful example of a 171-year-old media organisation publicly humiliating itself”.
