Demonstrators took to the streets in Istanbul and Ankara on Oct. 24 to challenge arrests and state action against news outlets, making press freedom the focus of rallies in Turkey.
Police counted at least 3,000 attendees in each city. Police said the Istanbul rally took place on the city’s Asian side. Journalists marched alongside rights advocates and opposition party representatives, AFP reported.
The Turkish Journalists’ Union said 11 journalists had been jailed in the preceding two months and several media outlets had shut. Authorities also took down digital outlet T24’s website and social media accounts, saying its content amounted to “LGBT propaganda,” AFP reported.
Earlier in October, a police raid stopped Halk TV’s broadcasts, and authorities installed a government-appointed administrator at the broadcaster, AFP reported. EconoTimes previously covered Amnesty International’s criticism of the intervention.
Turkey’s media landscape has also faced prosecutions and online censorship in the years since the failed 2016 coup attempt, AFP reported. Veteran journalist Zafer Arapkirli told AFP the Istanbul march defended society’s “right to access information.”
In Ankara, T24 coordinator Gokcer Tahincioglu told AFP journalists wanted “to practise journalism” freely and restore the conditions needed to report.
