NEWS OF THE TURKEY'S
Turkey Lifts Twitter Ban After Court Calls It Illegal
ISTANBUL — The Turkish government unblocked Twitter on Thursday, a day after the country’s highest court ruled that the two-week ban on the social media site violated freedom of expression.
Twitter had been blocked in Turkey since March 20, after Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan vowed to “eradicate” the site following the circulation of leaked recordings that implicated him and members of his inner circle in sweeping corruption allegations before local elections, which were held Sunday and resulted in a resounding victory for Mr. Erdogan’s Islamist-rooted Justice and Development Party.
The ruling by the Constitutional Court was handed down on Wednesday, but the government did not move to lift the ban on Twitter until Thursday evening — a time lag that generated a great deal of speculation about whether the government would abide by the ruling. A failure to do so would have set up a confrontation between the executive and judicial branches of the government, and probably emboldened Mr. Erdogan’s many critics, who say the prime minister has become increasingly authoritarian.
The lifting of the ban is likely to take some of the heat off Mr. Erdogan in international circles, where he has faced vocal criticism for measures he has taken to push back against the corruption investigation. But with a ban still in place on YouTube, and with other government steps to consolidate power — like purging the police force and judiciary and approving a law giving the government greater control over the courts — seemingly irreversible, domestic and foreign critics are unlikely to be satisfied.
In its ruling, the court called the Twitter ban “illegal, arbitrary and a serious restriction on the right to obtain information.” An earlier ruling against the ban by an administrative court in Ankara, the capital, had not been recognized by government authorities.
While many users flocked to Twitter to celebrate its return, some said they still could not access the site without using measures to circumvent the ban. The government’s telecommunications authority later issued a statement saying the restrictions would be lifted after certain technical steps had been taken.
“This is a major victory for democracy and freedom of expression in Turkey,” said Yaman Akdeniz, a law professor at Bilgi University in Istanbul who challenged the ban in the Constitutional Court. “We didn’t expect this today.”
The main opposition Republican People’s Party, which also submitted an appeal to the Constitutional Court, welcomed the decision. “This ruling by Turkey’s top Constitutional Court is a legal response to the prime minister’s denial of law and freedom of speech,” said Sezgin Tanrikulu, a party member. “I consider this as a major democracy lesson and underlining of the fact that social media is an important tool of accessing information in modern democracies.”
Access to YouTube was blocked a week after the Twitter ban in what the government said was a response to a leaked tape that purported to show top government officials discussing a possible military intervention in Syria. That leak has been described by government officials as an act of espionage and a threat to national security.
In addition to the bans on Twitter and YouTube, Parliament passed a new law granting the government broad authority to censor the Internet, generating heated criticism from abroad, particularly from the European Union and the United States. The United States State Department on Wednesday urged the government to respect the court decision against the Twitter ban, and to lift restrictions on YouTube.
“The next iceberg we will face is YouTube,” said Professor Akdeniz, who is preparing to submit a separate petition seeking to remove the block. “The same principle applies here. It is disproportionate to block an entire site because of some content that is deemed to be illegal.”
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