Turkey continues its ‘purge’ against freedom of press. This time Sweden & Switzerland!

Sweden stands firm and airs Armenian genocide documentary

Following Germany and the Netherlands, the Turkish government is now trying to gag freedom of expression and the press in Switzerland and Sweden! The next two episodes of Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan’s peculiar interpretation of democracy and freedom of expression involves his regime’s attempt to ban the broadcast of a documentary on the Armenian genocide on Swedish television, Sunday. The Turkish embassy intervened to block the film from being shown but was unsuccessful. On Monday, Turkey requested that a photograph depicting a young 15-year old Turkish boy killed by Turkish police forces in 2013 during the Gezi square protests against Erdogan, be removed. The controversial photo, which was part of an open street photo exhibition in Geneva, has a caption reading ‘I am Berkin Elvan. Police murdered me on the orders of the Turkish Prime Minister’. The exhibition is sponsored by ’Reporters without borders’, a group promoting freedom of press. Philippe d’Espine, spokesperson of the Geneva canton told French news agency AFP that representatives of the Turkish government asked for the photo to be removed. He said the local council would meet to decide on the matter.   

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