{"id":27636,"date":"2015-04-02T23:18:30","date_gmt":"2015-04-02T23:18:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.firdevstalkturkey.com\/?p=27636"},"modified":"2015-04-02T23:18:30","modified_gmt":"2015-04-02T23:18:30","slug":"a-sorry-state-of-affairs-in-turkey","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.firdevstalkturkey.com\/a-sorry-state-of-affairs-in-turkey\/","title":{"rendered":"A sorry state of affairs in Turkey"},"content":{"rendered":"

This week\u2019s sad but equally bizarre events in Turkey have shown us it is not just the blatant disregard for the rule of the law that we should be worried about but the core values and ideals that unify and sustain a society have eroded to such an extent that it is now truly alarming. Even an appalling terror attack did not generate a universal condemnation. Equally, the leaders of the country saw nothing wrong in exploiting a tragedy in order to serve their political ends. Nobody believed what they heard; conspiracy theories got more and more fantastical. <\/strong><\/p>\n

On the last day of March, while an unexplained power cut paralysed more than half of Turkey\u2019s 81 provinces for several hours,\u00a0 two armed militants of a shadowy left wing group gained access to Istanbul\u2019s Caglayan courthouse and took a prosecutor hostage in his office.\u00a0 <\/strong><\/p>\n

The prosecutor Mehmet Selim Kiraz was investigating and by all accounts making headway with the unsolved case of a 15-year old Berkin Elvan, a victim of police actions during Gezi events. Two gunmen linked to far-left Revolutionary People\u2019s Liberation Party-Front (DHKP-C) and claiming to seek justice for Elvan threatened to kill their hostage if their demands were not met. The 6 hour-long negotiations and desperate pleas by Berkin Elvan\u2019s father for the release of the prosecutor could not prevent a fatal shootout with the security forces.<\/strong><\/p>\n

The police operation in which both the militants and their hostage were killed was hailed by the President as a success long before a thorough investigation into the incident was carried out.\u00a0 <\/strong><\/p>\n

It was not just President Erdogan that jumped into conclusions. The leader of the main opposition Kemal Kilicdaroglu questioned the coincidence with the power cut and appeared to be blaming the intelligence agency while the siege was going on. The Prime minister wasted no time to clamp down on any kind of public dissent. \u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

The media, too, behaved in less than an ideal fashion. Using a video distributed by the gunmen showing them holding a gun to the prosecutor\u2019s head under the group\u2019s banners while the incident was still in motion fell short of professional and ethical standards. <\/strong><\/p>\n

The government responded by threatening to ban all demonstrations. During the funeral of Mr Kiraz, Prime Minister Ahmet Davuto\u011flu told the media that the government \u00a0would not tolerate demonstrations in the street \u201cwhoever they are and whatever their intent is\u201d. He also announced he ordered a ban on media organisations that published the photos of the previous day\u2019s hostage takers to report from the funeral. Several media sources including H\u00fcrriyet, Vatan, Cumhuriyet, Taraf, Samanyolu TV, CNN T\u00fcrk and Dogan News Agency were barred from entering Istanbul\u2019s Eyup Sultan Mosque where the prosecutor\u2019s funeral ceremony was held. . <\/strong><\/p>\n

While it is reasonable and acceptable to expect the media to refrain from endangering human lives and contacting hostage takers directly while the incident is going on, it is not reasonable to ask them not to report it. At times of such incidents, the media has to accept the instructions of the authorities and it is not unusual to impose a temporary black-out while the operation is underway and lives are at stake. Journalists must be wary of being used by criminals to spread their propaganda and fear. However, the fight against terror cannot be used as a pretext to deny the public the right to be informed. \u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

In Turkey, the government has imposed more than 150 gag orders during the last four years. It is not surprising that this latest order has met with apprehension. Disproportionate action such as launching an investigation by the Istanbul Chief Public Prosecutor\u2019s Office and the Terror and Organized Crimes Police Department into seven daily newspapers for \u201cmaking propaganda of the terrorist organization\u201d is a blatant attack on freedom of speech. <\/strong><\/p>\n

As\u00a0 CNN\u2019s veteran Turkey observer <\/strong>Ivan Watson put<\/strong><\/a> it, last Tuesday\u2019s events revealed several truths about today\u2019s Turkey.\u00a0\u00a0 \u201cThe country is tense and confused after years of back-to-back political crises\u201d and more importantly \u201cTurkey feels increasingly vulnerable to demons of its own making\u201d. <\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This week\u2019s sad but equally bizarre events in Turkey have shown us it is not just the blatant disregard for the rule of the law that we should be worried about but the core values and ideals that unify and sustain a society have eroded to such an extent that it is now truly alarming. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[4],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.firdevstalkturkey.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27636"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.firdevstalkturkey.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.firdevstalkturkey.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.firdevstalkturkey.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.firdevstalkturkey.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=27636"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.firdevstalkturkey.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27636\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":27638,"href":"https:\/\/www.firdevstalkturkey.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27636\/revisions\/27638"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.firdevstalkturkey.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=27636"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.firdevstalkturkey.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=27636"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.firdevstalkturkey.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=27636"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}