Court blocks access to news on seizure of İstanbul Municipality’s non-seizable loan

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The İstanbul 3rd Penal Judgeship of Peace has imposed an access block on the news regarding the seizure of a non-seizable loan received by the İstanbul Metropolitan Municipality (İMM) from abroad.

According to the access blocked news reported by Gerçek Gündem, KRT and SoL Haber, the İMM received a non-seizable loan of 565 million Turkish Lira (TRY) from abroad to finance its subway project.

However, the Met-Gün Construction company, the asphalt company of the previous term, seized this loan.

Examining the application of the construction company, the İstanbul 3rd Judgeship of Peace has ruled that the related news reported by these three media outlets shall be blocked to access and deleted on the grounds that "personal rights have been violated."

In line with this ruling, the KRT news titled "Asphalt seizure of İMM's 565 million TRY subway loan," the Gerçek Gündem news entitled "Scandalous asphalt seizure of İMM's 565 million TRY subway loan!" and the SoL Haber news titled "Hürriyet removed the news on İMM seizure from its website" have been blocked to access. They were all published on August 20.

The access blocks have been shared with the public by EngelliWeb (Blocked Web) project of the Freedom of Expression Association.

Kişilik hakları ihlali gerekçesiyle, İstanbul 3. Sulh Ceza Hakimliği'nin 20 Ağustos 2020 tarih ve 2020/3320 sayılı kararı ile @solhaberportali, @gercekgundem ve @krtkulturtv haberleri erişime engellendi. #EngelliWeb pic.twitter.com/IS5xBsOyjh

— EngelliWeb (@engelliweb) September 6, 2020

What happened?

Undertaking the asphalt works for the İstanbul Metropolitan Municipality (İMM) during the term of the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP), the Met-Gün Construction company took action in July 2020 to collect its outstanding debts. Having a receiving order issued, the company sent this order to the banks that work with the İMM.

As first reported by daily Hürriyet, the loan of 565 million TRY received from abroad to continue a suspended subway project was seized and the money was transferred to the bank account of the company. The money was at first in foreign exchange; however, before being seized, it was converted into TRY without permission. The İMM has then terminated its contracts with the state bank Vakıfbank, which approved the seizure procedure.

After it was reported in the news that the procedure of seizure was unlawful, daily Hürriyet has removed the news report regarding the issue from its website. (HA/SD)