Wikipedia banned in Turkey despite court ruling

Mohamed Abdelghaffar

The highest court in Turkey annulled on December 26 a ban imposed by the Turkish government on the free online encyclopedia, Wikipedia.

Six out of the ten jury members of the Turkish Constitutional Court approved a lifting of the ban on the site. The ban, they said, violates free speech, a right guaranteed by Article No. 26 of the Turkish constitution.

The ruling came after Wikipedia appealed the ban imposed on it by the Turkish government inside Turkey. A first degree court lifted the ban, but referred the whole matter to the constitutional court, which issued the same ruling.

Wikipedia founder, Jimmy Wales, commented on the ruling by writing “Welcome back, Turkey” on Twitter. He attached a photo of him during a visit to Turkey.

Nonetheless, Turkish users will find it difficult to log onto the website in the future, according to CNN Arabic.

It said the Turkish government would not likely enforce the ruling in the coming days.

Two-year ban

The government of Turkish President, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, banned Wikipedia for two whole years as of April 30, 2017.

Turkey decried entries that stated that the Turkish state had supported terrorist organizations, including the so-called Islamic State and Al-Qaeda.  The Turkish Ministry of Transport said the ban was imposed on the site after it ran two articles linking Turkey to terrorism. It said it warned the site against running the two articles, but it had refused to take them down.

Wales said on April 29 that obtaining information was a basic human right. He pledged to fight against the ban and for the right of Turkish citizens to get information.

In the line of fire

Erdogan has a habit of banning all the sites that oppose his policies and his personal views. The Turkish ruler wants Turkish citizens to see the world only through his own spectacles.

Erdogan’s government banned Twitter and Youtube for several hours in 2015, after it asked the two sites to take down several videos of protests that erupted in Turkey.

Turkish authorities also banned the Russian news agency, Sputnik. They also banned the chief of the bureau of this Russian news agency from entering Turkey. The bureau chief was detained at the airport in Turkey for several hours before he was told that he would not be allowed to enter Turkey.

The Russian Foreign Ministry considered the move illegal. It said the