Turkey blocked access to
Twitter and YouTube on Monday over the publication of photographs of an
Istanbul prosecutor held at gunpoint by far-left militants hours before he was
killed in a shootout last week, officials said.
Presidential spokesman Ibrahim
Kalin said a prosecutor had sought the block on access to social media sites
because some media organizations had acted "as if they were spreading
terrorist propaganda" in sharing the images.
"This has to do with the
publishing of the prosecutor's picture. What happened in the aftermath (of the
prosecutor's killing) is as grim as the incident itself," Kalin said.
"The demand from the
prosecutor's office is that this image not be used anywhere in electronic
platforms," he told a news conference in Ankara.
Istanbul prosecutor Mehmet
Selim Kiraz died from his wounds last Tuesday after security forces stormed the
office where members of the far-left Revolutionary People's Liberation
Party-Front (DHKP-C) had taken him hostage.
The DHKP-C had published a
picture of Kiraz with a gun to his head and said it would kill him unless its
demands were met.
"A request has been made
to both Twitter and YouTube for the removal of the images and posts but they
have not accepted it and no response has been given. That's why this decision
has been taken through a court in Istanbul."
Turkey temporarily blocked
Twitter and YouTube in the run-up to local elections in March 2014, after audio
recordings purportedly showing corruption in then-Prime Minister Tayyip
Erdogan's inner circle were leaked on their sites. That decision caused a
public uproar and drew heavy international criticism.
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