Conference to tackle press freedom and labor rights in Turkey

"Jailed journalists, threshold for collective bargaining, no freelancers rights, refusals of press cards, restrictions of accreditation, growing prosecutions, less freedom to publish." This bleak picture will be at the heart of an upcoming conference on press freedom and labor rights in Turkey, titled "Turkey: Fighting for journalists rights and freedoms in a politically polarized country" and held on Sept. 17-18 in Istanbul.

The conference is organized in a collaborative effort among Journalists Union of Turkey (TGS), International Federation of Journalists (IFJ), European Federation of Journalists (EFJ) and Journalists Association of Turkey (TGC). It is also the final event in the "Campaign to decriminalize Turkish journalism, to free speech and protect work place rights" project, supported by the European Commission's European Instrument for Democracy and Human Rights (EIDHR) program.

The objective of the two-year project, run by TGS and IFJ, was to promote press freedom, and defend the professional and labor rights of journalists as key actors in the exposure of human rights abuses. Mustafa Kuleli, General Secretary of TGS, spoke to Hürriyet Daily News about the project, the conference, and the state of the media. "The project very much integrated with the daily work of the TGS," said Kuleli. "Dozens of meetings and workshops with journalists took place in various cities, press trials were monitored with observers from Europe, publications were disseminated."

Oliver Money-Kyrle, Assistant General Secretary of the IFJ and who is responsible for the supervision of the IFJ's global project programme, including Turkey, also spoke to HDN: "The project supported the free journalism campaign, enabling us to maintain the monitoring and...