Istanbul, January 2, 2024—The Committee to Protect Journalists urges Turkish authorities to immediately release journalist Furkan Karabay and to stop criminalizing reporting on the judiciary.
Istanbul police took Karabay, an editor for independent news website Gerçek Gündem (The Real Agenda), into custody on December 28, 2023 according to news reports.
The next day, he was jailed pending trial by court order on the suspicion of “making targets of those who were tasked to combat terrorism” and defamation. Karabay’s detention followed his December 27 article about an ongoing corruption and bribery trial of members of the judiciary; he had based his story on publicly available court minutes, reports said.
“Turkish authorities must release journalist Furkan Karabay, whose arrest was blatantly retaliatory for his journalism,” said Özgür Öğret, CPJ’s Turkey representative. “Karabay’s arrest sends an intimidating message to Turkey’s journalists to abstain from reporting on the judiciary or face severe consequences. This criminalization of basic journalistic practices must end.”
Journalists in Turkey who report on members of the judiciary or judicial developments are frequently charged with “making targets of those who were tasked to combat terrorism.”
CPJ’s email to the Istanbul chief prosecutor’s office did not receive an immediate reply.