Global Voices Advocacy » Turkey

Turkey: No tweets from the courtroom!

Ece Temelkuran — Tue, 27 Dec 2011 15:19:49 +0000

“Today the judge is more strict” says the tweet, “One undercover police for each row! All monitoring the ones who are tweeting!“

In Istanbul-Turkey, today is the 2nd day of the hearings of 10 arrested journalists. Turkey is the leader country even before China and Iran with the figures of 107 arrested journalists.

Since the national mainstream media is not covering the news properly, colleagues of the detained journalists have no other choice but to tweet from the courtroom. According to Turkish law, the hearings are open unless a court order forbids it. But since yesterday, the judge has been constantly warning, then threatening those who try to give news from the courtroom. Today he said that those tweeting will be subjected to legal procedure. Neither the journalists nor the lawyers tweeting from the courtroom didn't really understand what the “procedure” will be. Alas, they tweet anyway.

The political arrests have become the legal (and lethal) weapon of the Turkish government to silence dissents and journalists. According to AFP figures 1/3 of the terrorists in the world are in Turkey. It is necessary to remind that the 500 detained students, 107 journalist and thousands of Kurdish politicians are considered to be “terrorists” in these political cases. Ironically, yesterday Interior Minister of Turkey said “Terrorism is not only on the mountains but in poetry, in paintings, in the universities, in NGO's. We will monitor those as well“.

To Keep updated, please follow @oemoral, @petite1ze, @etemelkuran for live tweeting from the court.

Advocacy Recap: Part II

Bhumika Ghimire — Tue, 15 Feb 2011 19:12:48 +0000

Last week, we looked back at the US government's handling of G20 summit protesters and pro-democracy bloggers in Vietnam facing persecution. Now let us talk about the Purdue University Professor who faced intense criticism for his views on homosexuality and Turkey's YouTube ban.

Professor Bert Chapman, a Government Information and Political Science Librarian, maintains a blog at Townhall.com titled Conservative Librarian. On October 27, he posted “An Economic Case Against Homosexuality”

“As a Christian, I agree with the biblical condemnation of the homosexual lifestyle. However, we are living in a nation and world that increasingly rejects biblical norms. To defend traditional sexual morality against the encroaching threat of homosexuality and other aberrant forms of sexual expression, we need to be able to do more than cite Bible verses. Fortunately, there are plenty of economic reasons for being against this lifestyle and I think as conservatives we need to be able to articulate why our nation cannot afford the extremely high financial costs of this lifestyle at a time when we are confronting dangerously high budget deficits, national debt, and personal debt.”

While some criticized the professor's post for being anti-gay and called for the University to fire him, there were more than handful of those who supported his rights to free expression and said that calling for his firing is attacking First Amendment rights.

Professor Chapman is still blogging at Conservative Librarian. Purdue University did not take any action against him. Going through his blog, I did not find any post regarding gays and lesbians after the controversial “An Economic Case Against Homosexuality”. The professor has stayed close to politics and international affairs.

On October 5, 2009, I discussed free speech issues in Turkey.

“Decision to block MySpace is not first step in Turkey's decision to police the internet. In 2008, blog host Blogger(owned by Google),popular video sharing site YouTube and about 850 sites were banned, according to a report published at The Christian science Monitor.

Decision to ban YouTube came after an “insulting” video on the country's founder Mustafa Kemal Atatürk appeared on the site.”

In November of 2010, just days after lifting ban on YouTube, Turkey re-instated the ban after a sex scandal. Los Angeles Times reported,

“Turkey has reimposed a ban on YouTube after the site refused to remove footage linked to a political sex scandal that erupted earlier this year.

The ban was reinstated just days after being lifted following a similar disagreement over videos, deemed illegal by authorities, that make fun of Turkey's founding figure Mustafa Kamel Ataturk.”

But a positive news from the region, recently Syria has decided to allow direct access to YouTube and Facebook-following turmoil in Egypt. According to AFP,

“In Damascus, Internet users said that for the first time since 2007, Syrians could directly log onto Facebook and YouTube without going through proxy servers abroad.

The authorities issued no statements regarding the development, but Syria's leading media and technology entrepreneur, Abdulsalam Haykal, told AFP that the request to lift the block “had reached Internet service providers.”

Let us hope that Turkey will re-evaluate its decision soon.

Turkey Unblocks YouTube, but Will Ban Be Short-Lived?

Jillian York — Tue, 02 Nov 2010 20:08:46 +0000

This post was originally written for the OpenNet Initiative blog

In 2007, Turkey blocked video-sharing site YouTube for the first time, joining a list of 12 or so other countries to have done so at some point, including Armenia, Syria, Morocco,and Tunisia. The site then became available intermittently throughout much of 2007, only to be fully blocked again in 2008, a block that would continue until earlier this week, when it was reported that the Turkish government had finally reversed the ban.

The decision to block YouTube stemmed from complaints about videos on the site ridiculing founder of modern Turkey, Mustafa Kemal Ataturk. Insulting Ataturk, or even “Turkishness,” is considered a crime. Though YouTube was initially asked to remove the offending videos, they refused, and the site was subsequently blocked.

Over the course of the past two years, there has been an increase in protesting of Turkey's Internet filtering, beginning online and more recently, taking to the streets. Now, Turkish netizens are reveling in their increased access.

Cyberscholar Dr. Yaman Akdeniz warns that the excitement may be short-lived:

Despite the earlier news that Turkey has lifted its ban on YouTube after almost 2.5 years, YouTube reinstated the four videos that were removed by a licensing agency in Germany. YouTube, in a statement circulated in Turkish late Monday night stated that the four videos did not violate its copyright violation policy and therefore they were put back into the system…

…It remains to be seen how the Turkish authorities will react to this action by YouTube but I strongly suspect that they will issue a new injunction to block access to YouTube.

The OpenNet Initiative's most recent research on Turkey can be found here.

Turkey: Violating online free speech

Bhumika Ghimire — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 16:37:44 +0000

Turkey, a modern democracy which takes pride in staying secular despite intense pressure from Islamic fundamentalists, unfortunately is actively engaged in curtailing online free speech.

Since September 18,2009 MySpace, a popular social networking site and Last FM-where you can listen to free music, has been blocked in the country for alleged copyright and intellectual protery right violations.

According to Reporters Sans Frontières,

“Copyright is often used as grounds for censoring the Internet,”

Turkey's decision to censor the internet could affect its relations with the European Union because

“Disconnecting access to a website on the orders of a prosecutor rather a judge is a violation of the European Convention on Human Rights, which Turkey has signed.”

Decision to block MySpace is not first step in Turkey's decision to police the internet. In 2008, blog host Blogger(owned by Google),popular video sharing site YouTube and about 850 sites were banned, according to a report published at The Christian science Monitor.

Decision to ban YouTube came after an “insulting” video on the country's founder Mustafa Kemal Atatürk appeared on the site.

In The Christian Science Monitor report, Turkish transportation minister defends the country's decision to police the internet

“The fight against elements that aim at degenerating societies and poisoning the youth and children is the fundamental task of each country. Every country has different regulations related to the Internet,”

To learn more about freedom of speech in Turkey, especially how an article in the country's penal code affects citizen's right to freedom of expression, here is a report by Press TV's Jody Sabral (recorded on 8th May,2008).

Blogger.com banned in Turkey

Sami Ben Gharbia — Sat, 25 Oct 2008 12:53:00 +0000

Note: Updates are being added towards the end of the post. Please keep checking.

A Turkish court has blocked access to the popular blog hosting service Blogger (Blogger.com and Blogspot.com owned by Google), since Friday, October 24th, 2008. According to BasBasBas.com, a Dutch blogger based in Istanbul, who alerted us to the issue:

It is suspected that the reason for this has something to do with Adnan Oktar, by some considered the leading Muslim advocate for creationism, who has in the past managed to get WordPress, Google Groups, as well as Richard Dawkins’ website.

Turkish Internet users are seeing this message when trying to visit Blogger.com and all blogs hosted on blogspot.com hosting service: “Access to this website has been suspended in accordance with decision no. 2008/2761 of the TR Diyarbakir First Criminal Court of Peace.”

Screenshot of the Turkish blockpage. Source: BasBasBas.com

This is the second instance of a popular blogging service being blocked in Turkey. In August 2007, the Turkish Fatih Second Civil Court of First Instance blocked access to the entire wordpress.com domain after alleged libel of Turkish Islamic-creationist, Adnan Oktar, aka Harun Yahya.

Adnan Oktar has been very harmful to the access of Turkish Netizens to the Internet. He has succeeded in getting a variety of major websites banned by court decisions. Next to these two blogging services, Adnan Oktar also filed a complaint against Google Groups, which led to the ban of the website.

Turkey also blocks access to both video-sharing websites, Youtube and Dailymotion over videos deemed insulting to the country’s founding father, Kemal Atatürk.

Slide, the maker of social networking widgets, has also been blocked by a Turkish court for “harboring pictures and articles that are considered to be insulting to Ataturk.”

Update #1 via Cyber-Rights.Org.TR:

It is now being reported by Turk.internet.com that the blocking order is related to an intellectual property infringement. Digitürk is a subscription based digital TV platform in Turkey which owns the right to transmit the live coverage of the Turkish football league games. Digitürk obtained the blocking order through the Diyarbakir court according to the Turk.internet.com news as there were blog entries providing information and links to known websites which transmit pirated transmission of the live football league games.

Update #2 via CyberLaw Blog: CyberLaw Blog reported today (October 28, 2008) that the ban on blogspot.com blogging platform has been lifted by the Diyarbakir First Criminal Court:

It is, however, unclear why the order has been lifted and it seems like the ban is lifted until Digitürk provides to the court further evidence with regards to its claims for football streaming piracy. Therefore, I would not be surprised to see the blocking order and the ban reinstated.

Three Easy Steps to Block Sites in Turkey

Jillian York — Thu, 25 Sep 2008 21:42:08 +0000

In a clear instance of vexatious litigation, a Turkish court has blocked the Web site of prominent evolutionist Richard Dawkins following complaints from Islamic creationist and author Adnan Oktar. Oktar, who writes under the nom de plume Harun Yahya, filed the complaint last week; when Turkish Internet users now attempt to access Dawkins’ site, they are presented with a message that reads: ‘access to this site has been suspended in accordance with a court decision'.

This is not the first time Oktar has been involved in such litigation. In April 2007, Oktar successfully filed a defamation complaint against Turkish online news site Eksi sozluk. Oktar filed the complaint because of comments that users of Eksi sozluk had posted about him; a similar site, Superpoligon, was also blocked. Access to Eksi sozluk was restored shortly after the complaints were filed, and the offending remarks removed by the site's administrator.

Less than four months later, Oktar appealed to WordPress.com to remove a number of blogs which he deemed slanderous. Following an unfavorable reaction from WordPress, Oktar again filed a complaint with the Turkish judicial system, which in turn blocked WordPress within Turkey. Oktar's complaint was based on a number of blogs created by rival Edip Yuksel, a prominent dissident. To date, WordPress remains blocked, despite numerous campaigns to unblock the site. Turkish bloggers now use Wordprexy, a mirror site set up by activist group Great Firewall of Turkey, to read and post to WordPress blogs. Less than six months later, Oktar filed a complaint against Google Groups, which led to that site being blocked within Turkey as well (Google.com remained accessible; only the subdomain groups.google.com was filtered). It is once again available.

Oktar's latest rancor is directed at Richard Dawkins, a British ethologist and evolutionary biologist. Following the release of Oktar's creationist book, Atlas of Creation, Dawkins wrote on his Web site:

“I am at a loss to reconcile the expensive and glossy production values of this book with the breathtaking inanity of the content.”

Oktar, who was involved in the attempt to ban Dawkins’ book The God Delusion in Turkey, retaliated by filing a complaint in regards to Dawkins’ Web site. A Turkish judicial court sided with Oktar, and ordered Turk Telecom to ban the site.

In each instance, the foreign press was quick to assume that the blockings were related to Turkey's rising Islamist party, the AKP. It is perhaps more alarming that politics had little to do with it. It is surprising that Oktar, considered a charlatan by the Turkish public, and having so recently run afoul of the law, carries so much weight in the Turkish judicial system.

In fact, Oktar carries neither more nor less weight than anyone else. According to a recent Reuters article, a law passed in May now allows the Telecommunications Directorate to close down websites based on complaints by individual users, thus enabling anyone with a complaint to get a site blocked. The problem therefore lies in the ease with which anyone can file such a complaint.

On Oktar's Web site, HarunYahya.com, there is a quote from the Qur'an: “Truth has come and falsehood has vanished. Falsehood is always bound to vanish.” If Dawkins’ work is the falsehood Oktar is referencing, then indeed he has succeeded in making it “vanish”…if only from the Turkish Internet.

Posted on ONI Blog

Turkey: Bloggers Banning Themselves

Deborah Dilley — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 17:35:44 +0000

If you are a long-time follower of the Turkish blogosphere you will have undoubtedly heard about the Turkish ban on WordPress….and the periodic bans on YouTube, and on the social-networking widget site Slide, oh..and now on Dailymotion as well. I think that is all.. Isn't it? It is hard to keep track now-a-days and frustrating. Turkish bloggers feel the same way too, and are protesting the constant banning of sites by voluntarily banning their own.

So how are Turkish bloggers protesting these periodic bans on the internet? By putting the following up on their website: Bu siteye erişim kendi kararıyla engellenmiştir which translates roughly into “This site is blocked by [the author's] own choice”.
This protest is to last until Wednesday August 20th. And of course, this isn't an issue that many are writing about, just participating. The anafikir blog [tr] has a separate page where you can find the code to convert your website to the “blocked” page and a running list of sites that are participating. Several Turkish media sites are covering the protests and providing links to forum groups and Facebook sites. Techcrunch gives a history of the block as they have observed it:

The problem has gotten so bad that Turkish blogs are now banning themselves in protest. The fake bans started with Firat Yildiz, who put this message up on his blog[...]Then another Turkish blogger, Selim Yoruk, created this page with a piece of code that lets any blogger easily add the same message to his homepage. Nearly 200 Turkish blogs have (temporarily) shut themselves down in this manner. The point is to show Turkish Web surfers what the Internet would look like if the censorship continues unabated.

Turkish blog Metroblogging:Istanbul is supporting the ban by advertising it and encouraging dialog:

After the ban of many a video streaming websites by the Turkish government, bloggers decided to take the matter into their own hands by protesting the Chinese style censorship going on. We were getting used to the void left by YouTube when suddenly, Dailymotion, another video streaming website got banned also. [...] Show us your support by leaving a comment and having a whinge with us about the whole situation :)

It is too early to predict if the protest will have any effect, however, expat blogger located in Turkey, SortiPreneur had the following to say about the situation:

The sites being shut down is a problem, and I am glad there's a voice being raised in protest. However, I think the Turkish internet community needs to address the issue with more mature moves in parallel.

The sites are shut down not as censorship, but as a result of court decisions. This is not dissimilar to Napster being shut down in the U.S. And, contrary to some of the commentary on blogs, not all bans have to do with insults to Ataturk (although a few of the bans are for those insults, due to the fact that it's illegal to insult Ataturk in Turkey) , but are a result of civil libel suits by private individuals. In other words, the site bans are in accordance with the legal system here. BTW, I am not saying I agree with any of the particular laws, but I don't categorically have a problem with a system where laws are being enforced.

The primary problem I see is the lack of understanding Turkish courts have about the internet, and especially about user-generated content. It seems to be that there needs to be specialized courts designated as venues for online content related prosecution.

Having commented on the problem, let me point out the role (or lack thereof) of Turkish NGOs that have the responsibility to lobby on behalf of the internet industry.

Is this the way to concretely address censorship in Turkey? Or are there other possibilities as SortiPreneur suggests? We invite you to weigh on this protest.

Turkey: Dailymotion blocked

Sami Ben Gharbia — Wed, 06 Aug 2008 21:15:46 +0000

Access to the french video-sharing website Dailymotion.com has been blocked in Turkey since August 2nd 2008. According to Erkan Saka, an Istanbul-based blogger, “the decision to ban the site came without any explanation.”

This is the second instance of a popular video-sharing website being blocked in Turkey. YouTube was blocked on and off over videos deemed insulting to the country’s founding father, Kemal Atatürk.

A similar situation is found in Tunisia where both video-sharing websites, Dailymotion and Youtube, are made inaccessible.

Slide blocked in Turkey

Sami Ben Gharbia — Fri, 28 Mar 2008 23:23:53 +0000

A Turkish court banned access to Slide, the maker of social networking widgets, for “harboring pictures and articles that are considered to be insulting to Ataturk.”

In a note to Slide users in Turkey, Slide announced that it has contacted the Turkish government in hopes of resolving the issue:

If you use Slide in Turkey, you've probably noticed that you are no longer able to access the Slide website or our applications (you may not even be able to access this post). The Turkish government has accused Slide of “harboring pictures and articles that are considered to be insulting to Ataturk,” founder of the republic.

We have contacted the government of Turkey in an effort to resolve this situation and will keep you updated on any changes. In the meantime, we're trying our best to enable Turkish citizens to access our website and applications again.

According to Slide statistics, Slide widgets are being viewed by more than 143 million unique viewers every month in more than 200 countries on websites like Facebook, MySpace, Hi5, Orkut, and Blogger.

Turkey again blocks access to YouTube

Sami Ben Gharbia — Wed, 23 Jan 2008 18:21:01 +0000

A Turkish court has again blocked access to the popular video-sharing site YouTube over a video clip allegedly insulting the country's founding father, Kemal Atatürk.

According to The New Anatolian, Turkish users trying to access Youtube are receiving a message explaining the ban : “Access to www.youtube.com site has been suspended in accordance with decision no: 2008/55 of T.R. Ankara 12th Criminal Court of Peace.”

This is the third time that Youtube has been banned in Turkey following similar court decisions deeming that videos appearing on the site were insulting to the father of modern Turkey,Kemal Atatürk.

On August 17, 2007, the Turkish Fatih Second Civil Court of First Instance blocked access to the entire wordpress.com domain after alleged libel of Turkish Islamic-creationist, Adnan Oktar, aka Harun Yahya.

We invite you to explore our Access Denied Map and learn more about censorship of popular web 2.0 websites in the world.