Nearly two years ago, Soner Yalcin and more than a dozen of his employees at the online news outlet OdaTV joined the growing list of incarcerated Turkish journalists. Yalcin, owner of OdaTV, is one of the sharpest critics of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan's government.
As their trial proceedings dragged on, challenges to the state's case grew, and most of the outlet's journalists were released, pending the trial's conclusion. But Yalcin and two others remain behind bars, 22 months and counting.
Turkey is disputing a new report that names it as the world's leading jailer of journalists, with scores behind bars — ahead of Iran, China and other authoritarian states.
The Committee to Protect Journalists met with officials in Ankara this week about the problem, and found them adamant that the journalists had broken criminal laws. The ongoing international attention to Turkey's treatment of the media has raised hope that reforms could be forthcoming.
The Two-Way
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