Turkey: Legal control as a weapon against journalists
For years,
Turkey
has been making international headlines for it's lackluster track record on press freedom and freedom of speech: Turkey is ranked 159th out of 180 in the latest Reporters
Without Borders
Press Freedom Index. According to the Turkish Journalists' Union, 18 journalists were in prison at the end of March.
However, the restrictions on press freedom are by no means limited to imprisonment: Judicial restrictions are also part of a repressive system designed to systematically silence critical voices. Measures including house arrest, bans on leaving the country, and obligations to report regularly to the authorities are increasingly being used as a means of exerting pressure.
Originally intended as an alternative to pre-trial detention, they are becoming an instrument of de facto punishment — especially for journalists.
Hundreds of journalists are not in prison, but at home, no longer allowed to practice their profession. Recently, many well-known media professionals in Turkey have been subjected to such treatment.
A protective measure or an unfair punishment?
According to the law, judicial inspections are intended to prevent suspects from escaping or tampering with evidence. They are used in cases where there is a strong suspicion of a crime and officials see a risk of people trying to flee the law or conceal their identities. However, such measures are also increasingly being used in the wake of accusations of libel for example or posting critical social media posts, in other words, for offences that do not fall into the "catalog of crimes" defined in law.
Veysel Ok
, a lawyer who has represented many journalists in Turkey — including German daily Die Welt correspondent Deniz Yücel — no longer sees judicial control as a straightforward means of safeguarding proceedings, but as a "penalty-like sanction."
"By law, these measures may only be imposed if the conditions for imprisonment are met. But this is often ignored in practice," explained Ok. Court orders have now become the norm, he said, especially in cases relating to freedom of expression.
"Some are confined to their homes for years and can no longer work as journalists. Even if they are acquitted in the end, they have spent their most productive years under these restrictions," said the lawyer. Even social media posts or political criticism can trigger such measures.
Increasing numbers of journalists face restrictions
"In the past, this was not so common," said Ok. "Today, control measures are imposed automatically — in political cases, against protesters or even against journalists. Almost everyone under investigation is now subject to some form of restriction."
This includes measures such as house arrest or bans on leaving the country, which prevent media professionals from doing their job. These, Ok said, also violate d the decisions of the
Constitutional Court
. He highlighted the case of activist
Nurcan Kaya
, in which the court ruled that such measures were only permissible if there were valid grounds for detention. Despite this, the practice continues, he said.
These measures have two objectives, explained Ok: "On the one hand, those involved are punished before a verdict has even been reached. The second goal is to create a climate of fear in a society that suppresses freedom of expression."
The overcrowded prisons in Turkey also encouraged the spread of judicial control, he explained. "There are currently over 400,000 people in prison. But hundreds of thousands are living in detention-like conditions — in their city or their home. They are not arrested, but controlled — it is a method that has long since become a punishment."
A bid to silence potential critics?
Erol Onderoglu, the head of Reporters Without Borders (RSF) in Turkey, is also concerned, viewing the widespread practice of judicial control as a direct attack on the right to free reporting, as well as a curtailing of the population's ability to inform itself freely.
According to Onderoglu, judicial inspections should only be applied in exceptional cases, for example when particularly serious accusations have been made. But in Turkey, a simple libel charge or a social media post is now enough to trigger restrictions on journalists.
For Onderoglu, the impact of this is clear: "This unlawful practice serves to deliberately harass and intimidate critical journalists. It is an expression of a preemptive will to punish."
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Foreign governments were standing by to help resolve disputes if necessary. Intelligence chiefs in both countries reported back to superiors in their capitals: This is someone we can work with. Smuggled lists In time, those early exchanges birthed a whole new infrastructure. In a leafy district of Kyiv, near hipster cafes and beauty salons, a nondescript three-story building became HUR's Coordination Headquarters for the Treatment of Prisoners-of-War. On the top floor, Usov and his HUR subordinates meet regularly in a conference room with the families of POWs who come dressed in T-shirts bearing logos of their son or husband's brigade and often harangue the officials over a lack of results. In the basement, analysts scour Russian websites and social media feeds for clues about POWs' location and condition. They have compiled a vast database that includes 200 data points about each individual including height, eye color and Russian responses to questions from the Red Cross. Ukrainians released in swaps have smuggled out lists with the names of comrades in a specific cell. Photos of those lists are compiled in evidence to convince the Russians a particular person is in their captivity. 'To get people back, we have to know who we're fighting for,' said Viktoriia Petruk, a 34-year-old who leads the analytics department and spoke for the first time to the media about her work. Viktoriia Petruk leads a group of HUR analysts who scour websites and social media to feed a database of POWs held by the Russians. The basement analysts have identified almost 200 detention facilities across Russia and occupied parts of Ukraine where Ukrainian combatants are held often in dire conditions. Ukraine has five dedicated POW camps, most of them former prisons where the captive Russians earn money sewing, chopping wood, or producing furniture for sale at Ukrainian stores. Kyiv is eager to show Western partners it has moral high ground by treating its prisoners better than Russia. Logistics have often been fraught. In January 2024, a Russian military plane carrying 65 Ukrainian POWs to a prisoner swap was shot down near the border, a move Moscow blamed on Kyiv, which hasn't taken responsibility for it. During a lull in swaps, and facing political protests from prisoners' relatives, HUR concocted several long-shot schemes to speed things up: offering convicted pro-Russian collaborators and even the bones of long-buried Russian spies for exchange. Russia didn't take the bait. But when peace talks stalled in Istanbul this Spring, both countries consented to another round, this time bigger than ever before. On a sunny recent morning, Usov again headed north from Kyiv to greet a fresh cohort of hundreds of exchanged Ukrainian soldiers. Injured men limped and staggered up to the general to thank him, then asked a question: when would be the next round of prisoner trades that might bring their brothers-in-arms home? Write to Matthew Luxmoore at Drew Hinshaw at and Joe Parkinson at The Secret Channel Russia and Ukraine Use to Trade Prisoners of War The Secret Channel Russia and Ukraine Use to Trade Prisoners of War
