Journalism organisations in Turkey have criticised a report by a pro-government think tank that they say catalogues journalists working for international news media in a way that amounts to “blacklisting.” The Journalists’ Union of Turkey said Sunday it plans to file a criminal complaint against the Foundation for Political, Economic and Social Research, a think tank with close ties to Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his party.
The think tank’s July 5 report aimed to evaluate the news coverage of the Turkish language services of foreign news outlets, including British public broadcaster BBC, German public broadcaster Deutsche Welle, the US Government-funded Voice of America, Russian news agency Sputnik, and broadcaster Euronews, headquartered in Lyon, France.
The 202-page report listed dozens of individual journalists and their tweets to argue an alleged bias against the Turkish Government in their coverage.
The think tank also put the journalists in “network maps” with their current and past jobs in Turkish media with “leftist and secular” leanings to claim their journalism clashed with press ethics. The SETA think tank said coverage of key recent events showed an “anti-government news language,” with the exception of China International Radio’s Turkish service, which the report also analysed.