Erdoğan’s Justice and Development Party (AKP) government defends the policemen and prosecutors behind these arrests, usually claiming that the journalists support some terrorism organization or another, whether it’s an ultranationalist group or a Kurdish one. The AKP hardly seems moved by international criticism. When the American novelist Paul Auster, in an interview last month with a Turkish newspaper, declared that he wouldn’t come to Turkey to promote his book because of the severe limitations placed on the press, Erdoğan, in his signature Istanbul-by-way-of-South-Boston manner, replied, “Who cares if you come or not?”
More insidious has been Erdoğan’s quieter method of censoring critical journalists. Recently, the Turkish journalist Can Dündar explained in a newspaper column what it’s like to work in Erdoğan’s Turkey. Dündar, then a TV show host, had been preparing a segment about the prime minister’s controversial statement that he might deport 100,000 Armenians illegally working in Turkey. A superior called Dündar at the last minute to inform him that they would not be running the segment. Dündar challenged the hasty withdrawal, but soon received another call.
Suzy Hansen: The Assault On Turkish Journalists Continues | The New Republic
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