Turkish Police Storm Halk TV, Kill Broadcast and Hand Network to Government Trustee
Turkish authorities raided the country's most-watched opposition news channel, halting its broadcast and installing a state-appointed manager.
Police raided the Istanbul headquarters of Halk TV early Wednesday, shutting down its broadcast and installing a government-appointed trustee to run the opposition broadcaster, a move press freedom groups condemned as a serious blow to independent media in Turkey [262097][262804].
Hundreds of police officers entered the building, and staff were not allowed in while the search was ongoing, the channel reported on its own website [262371][262804]. Halk TV chairman Cafer Mahiroglu called the raid on the broadcaster's Istanbul headquarters "a dark day for Turkey" [262097].
A trustee is a government-appointed manager given control of a company or institution, a mechanism Turkish authorities have repeatedly used to take over outlets critical of the government [262801]. The Savings Deposit Insurance Fund (TMSF) has now taken control of 10 television channels in the past 20 months, with Halk TV placed under its management less than a year after the same fate befell TELE1 [262789]. İbrahim Paşalı, a former columnist for Yeni Şafak who has held management roles at Flash TV, Ekotürk, Habertürk, Show TV, Bloomberg HT, and TELE1, has been appointed to the trustee panel now running Halk TV [262793].
The takeover drew sharp international criticism. Nacho Sánchez Amor, the Council of Europe's rapporteur on Turkey, said the government aims to control the entire media landscape [262783]. Amnesty International called the move a direct attack on free speech [262787]. International journalism organizations, Amnesty International, and Human Rights Watch have called for Halk TV to be allowed back on air, while PEN Berlin described the operation as "de facto expropriation" [262783]. Journalist groups said the decision "clearly shows that no legal protection for the media remains in Turkey" [262801].
The crackdown extended online. Turkish authorities blocked access to all of Halk TV's social media accounts, covering its YouTube, X, Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, and Telegram pages, with a combined following of more than 8.55 million people [262784]. Turkey also blocked the X account of the Workers' Party of Turkey (TİP), which has 582,000 followers, under a court order [262798], and blocked access to Mezopotamya Ajansı's X account following a complaint from the Presidency's Cybersecurity Directorate [262795]. Twenty-one human rights organizations issued a joint call demanding Turkey end internet censorship and urging social media platforms to act immediately to protect human rights [260453].
In parliament, YENİ Party Member of Parliament Özgür Karabat and fellow party MPs protested the government-appointed trustee at Halk TV by covering their eyes and mouths with black tape during a session of the Turkish Grand National Assembly's Plan and Budget Committee [262800].
Turkey ranks near the bottom of the United Nations' press freedom index, behind countries such as Iraq, Sudan, and Cuba [262371].