Trying times

FREDERIKE GEERDINK (pictured), a Dutch journalist with a close interest in the Kurds, claims to be the only Western journalist in the mainly Kurdish city of Diyarbakir. On January 6th anti-terrorist police raided her apartment. “Terrorism police just searched my house. Team of 8 guys. They take me to the station now. Charge: ‘propaganda for terrorist organisation,’” Ms Geerdink tweeted as she was hauled off.

The timing could hardly have been worse. Bert Koenders, the Dutch foreign minister, was visiting Ankara. And even as Ms Geerdink was being grilled about her Kurdish contacts, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Turkey’s president, was telling diplomats “there is no freer press, either in Europe or anywhere in the world, than in Turkey.”

Mr Erdogan and his Islamist Justice and Development (AK) party catapulted to power in 2002. His reforms persuaded the European Union to open membership talks with Turkey in 2005. But he has since become increasingly intolerant. Fearing his ire, media bosses have sacked hundreds of critical hacks. The pressure rose when a corruption probe of Mr Erdogan’s inner circle became public just over 12 months ago. Last week, police interrogated Sedef Kabas, a TV anchorwoman, for alluding in tweets to government efforts to quash the scandal. Scores of journalists are now being prosecuted. Even cartoonists are under attack.

Dunja Mijatovic, the media freedom representative for the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe, notes that women are being singled out. “Female journalists and bloggers are being fiercely attacked on Twitter, Facebook, and in online articles and blogs. This is an additional way of silencing critical voices, an issue that my office will focus on and analyse in the near future,” she says.

AK is pondering draft legislation that would give the prime minister authority to block websites and remove content for a limited period before a judge decides whether to uphold the decision or not. A separate bill sharply reduces the number of judges needed to approve such measures. “The government will use the judges as a rubber stamp,” claims Kerem Altiparmak, a rights lawyer. AK officials insist the moves are aimed at protecting “national security” and “moral values”.

Many believe the new laws are really aimed at stopping future recordings of conversations between those incriminated in the corruption probe or other embarrassing material appearing online. On January 5th a parliamentary commission dominated by AK voted against sending four former ministers, including Turkey’s one-time Europe minister, Egemen Bagis, to trial. They had been accused of receiving bribes from Reza Zarrab, an Iranian who figures in the investigation.

Censorship is getting subtler. Last month the government issued a decree calling for internet service providers to install costly new systems that allow the removal of offensive content without blocking a website. “Many smaller providers will be driven out of the market, giving the government further control,” reckons Ali Riza Keles, a cyberactivist.

The government’s aversion to any mention of graft has assumed bizarre proportions. Last month, as the president spoke at a ceremony in Konya, his bodyguards detained a spectator when they overheard him recounting a theft incident at his grandchild’s school. After the local prosecutor declined to press charges he was said to have been exiled to an Anatolian backwater. Meanwhile, back in Diyarbakir, Ms Geerdink says she was lucky that Mr Koenders was in the country. He said he was “shocked” by her detention: she was released soon afterwards. “Free again. Terrorism squad takes me home now. I insisted on that,” she tweeted.