WordPress.com Access Blocked

The judiciary in Turkey has yet again blocked access to a whole website because of the content of one item. After the alternative dictionary eksi sözlük and the Antoloji.com websites, now access to the WordPress.com site has been blocked, following a complaint by Adnan Oktar.

Several NGOs, including the Reporters Sans Frontieres (RSF) had condemned blocking a whole site as "radical and disproportionate".

A civil court of first instance in Fatih, Istanbul decreed in decision 2007/195 that access to the platform WordPress.com, which includes several Internet diaries, should be blocked.

Internet users trying to access the site are met with the sentence "Access to this site has been suspended in accordance with decision no: 2007/195 of T.C. Fatih 2.Civil Court of First Instance", both in Turkish and English.

Not the first time

The popular Internet dictionary Eksisözlük (literally "sour dictionary") had been closed on 17 April by a civil court in Eyüp, Istanbul, on the basis that it included writings that violated Oktar's personal rights. A week before, the news website Superpoligon had been closed by the same court. At around the same time, the website antoloji.com, which describes itself as an "Internet culture and art centre" was closed by court decree. The closure was apparently based on what a visitor to the site wrote about Adnan Oktar. The sites have since been reopened. (EÖ/AG)