Turkey has banned the German broadcaster Deutsche Welle and American broadcaster Voice of America’s website over licensing issues.
In February, Turkey’s Supreme Board of Radio and Television (RTUK) announced a new measure of licensing for international media that international media required licensing approval from the board for publishing online content in the Turkish language.
The Ankara Criminal Court decided to take down the websites of the respective broadcaster at the request of the Board (RTUK) on Thursday.
DW Director-General, Peter Limbourg said that we told the Chairman of the RTUK in person why we could not apply for the license. The license requires deletion of online content as on RTUK demand and it is not acceptable for an independent broadcaster.
He also added that the German broadcaster will carry legal strategy against the ban.
The U.S Agency for Global Media the upper body of VOA has not responded on the matter yet, but VOA Spokesperson, Bridget Serchak said that she thinks any government action to silence news outlets is a violation of press freedom. She added that the outlet will do every endeavor to ensure that its Turkish-speaking audience maintains access to a free and open internet employing all accessible methods.
The Board’s (RTUK) February decision took in line with the new media law which was brought in august 2019. 2019 media law authorizes the Board (RTUK) to request a license from media service providers, impose fines, suspend broadcasting for three months and cancel the broadcast license for not following the RTUK principles.
The decision has been criticized by several social groups and opposition leaders. Ilhan Tasci, an RTUK member from Turkey’s main opposition the Republican People’s Party wrote on Twitter “Here is freedom of the press and advanced democracy!” Therefore, the decision affected relations between Turkey and United States. State Department spokesman Ned Price tweeted in February the “decision to expand government control over free press outlets.”
The Supreme Board of Radio and Television (RTUK) has mainly consisted of ruling party members and its ally the MHP party.
Turkey has a bad record of press freedom, it has 149th ranking out of 180 nations on the world press freedom index.
