Twitter officials will come to Turkey for talks to open office, minister says

ISTANBUL

AFP Photo

Representatives from Twitter are set to come to Turkey in mid-April for talks with Turkish officials, Communications Minister Lütfi Elvan has said, hinting that the company will open an office in the country.

Twitter officials will have talks with the Directorate of Telecommunication (TİB) and the Communication Technologies Institution (BTK), Elvan told journalists on April 8, after being asked whether the company would need approval from his ministry to open an office.

Turkey officially unblocked Twitter on April 3, a full 24 hours after the Constitutional Court ruled that the ban was a violation of free speech. The TİB blocked access to Twitter on March 20, just 10 days before the local elections. Hours before the ban, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan had vowed to “wipe out” the social media platform.

When asked about Metin Feyzioğlu, the president of Turkey’s Bar Associations (TBB), who had made an individual complaint to the Constitutional Court against the YouTube ban, Elvan said the right to individual application could be used when the judicial process was completed.

Access to YouTube was blocked on March 27 by the TİB without a court decision, hours after recordings of a key security meeting on Syria were leaked online. YouTube has filed an individual complaint to the Turkish Constitutional Court against the ban, which is currently still in place.