Media should be impartial: President Erdoğan

ANKARA

Doğan Holding Honorary Chairman Aydın Doğan shakes hands with President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan after an iftar dinner at Huber Palace in Istanbul. Behind him is Hürriyet Editor-in-Chief Fikret Bila.

The media should conduct its duties in a way that is impartial, fair and in compliance with the basic principles of the profession, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said at an iftar with media representatives on June 17. 

“To express the truth in its plain sense is an essential principle of this profession because a distorted truth is not a truth. Biased, one-sided or even intentional news is not a news in its true sense,” Erdoğan said at Istanbul Huber Palace.

“Unfortunately we have faced severe propaganda and especially disinformation instead of news for many years. Particularly those who [had positions of power] in the media world used that power to reflect their ideals and to continue to preserve their positions instead of being a voice for the people or strengthening democracy,” he said. 

“It is very important to conduct these works within an impartial and fair manner which is in compliance with the basic principles of the profession,” he said. 

Erdoğan asked media representatives to act in accordance with “the interest of our country and our people in a national and local manner.”

“I see no difference between those who sell their news headlines with the instructions of a terrorist organization and those who take to the mountains with a gun in their hands. There will be consequences for engaging in acts which threaten national security by violating the law in collaboration with members of terrorist organizations,” he said. 

“Nobody can ignore the national will and see itself above the people and those that they choose,” he said, adding that journalists had to comply with the law. 

“What we call freedom is not something unlimited. There is a limit to that,” he added.