Weekly Digest: Media Blocks in Turkey and the Philippines, New Reuters News President

Turkey’s government blocked access to public broadcasters Voice of America and Deutsche Welle.

The reason is the refusal of these two organisations to apply for licences in Turkey under the country’s media regulation law. Critics argue this law is increasing censorship. The decision is likely to be challenged in the courts. 

As Reuters notes, Turkish media watchdog, “whose policy-making board is dominated by [president] Erdogan’s AK party and its allies, frequently fines broadcasters that are critical of the government.” Mainstream media are dominated by Erdogan’s supporters, but alternative media are available, and social media is increasingly being used as a source for news.

For almost three years in 2017 to 2020, Turkey blocked access to Wikipedia over the content of one of the platform’s English-language articles. The block was lifted by the decision of the Constitutional Court of Turkey.

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In the Philippines, the government ordered the shutdown of Rappler, one of the biggest independent news outlets in the 110-million-people country. Founded a decade ago, the publication has exposed the government’s disinformation campaigns, as well as reported on human rights violations in the state’s “war on drugs.”

For about five years, Rappler and its co-founder and CEO Maria Ressa have been under the government’s scrutiny in what has been called “judicial harassment.” Rappler’s founder and CEO Maria Ressa was awarded a Nobel Peace Prize in 2021 (along with Dmitry Muratov, editor-in-chief of the Russian newspaper Novaya Gazeta, which suspended publication shortly after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine).

Rappler is not complying with the order to shut down for now and will fight it in the courts. As Axios notes, the Philippines is now undergoing a change of presidential administrations, with Rodrigo Duterte being replaced by newly elected Ferdinand Marcos Jr. We are yet to see whether the new government will improve the situation with press freedom. 

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Paul Bascobert, former CEO of American newspaper company Gannett, has been named as CEO of Reuters News. 

The 58-year-old media manager has also previously worked for Bloomberg Media and Dow Jones (publisher of The Wall Street Journal). “Following a nine-month search, Bascobert joins Reuters News as the business rebounds from the pandemic and gets a boost from the return of live events,” the publication notes.

In his role, Bascover will oversee Reuters’ editor-in-chief Alessandra Galloni, who in 2021 became the first woman to hold the position in the agency’s 170-year history.

Bonus — Four more stories you might want to check out:

• The New York Times: Substack Is Laying Off 14% of Its Staff
• CNN: Supreme Court declines to revisit landmark First Amendment decision, leaving higher bar for libel in place 
• Deadline: French State TV & Radio Workers Strike Over Plans To Abolish License Fee, Merger Fears 
• The Guardian: Reporter shot to death in Mexico, the 12th journalist killed there this year 

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