September 1, 2015

01/09/2015: TURKEY – SEEMO CONDEMNS DETENTION OF BRITISH JOURNALISTS IN TURKEY

Vienna, 01/09/2015

The South East Europe Media Organisation (SEEMO) express concern over a recent case of media freedom interference in Turkey.

Two VICE journalists and their fixer were arrested on 27 August 2015 in front of their hotel in Diyarbakır in the south-east of the country, where they had been reporting on clashes between Turkish security forces and members of the outlawed Kurdistan’s Workers Party (PKK). They were charged by a Turkish court for “working on behalf of a terrorist group”.

Jake Hanrahan and Philip Pendlebury, and local fixer Mohammed Ismael Rasool were filming clashes between police authorities and members of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), in a region where journalist access has been limited. The media workers were interrogated and accused of having links to the PKK and the Islamic State.

SEEMO protests strongly against such accusations and urges the authorities in Turkey to secure conditions that allow journalists to freely report on all public interest events in the country.

The press freedom work of the South East Europe Media Organisation (SEEMO) is supported by the European Centre for Press and Media Freedom (ECPMF) project, as part of a grant by the European Commission.