WSJ says Turkey detains reporter for three days

ANKARA - Agence France-Presse

Turkey detained a staff journalist for The Wall Street Journal for almost three days without access to a lawyer, the newspaper reported on Dec. 31, adding to growing concerns over press freedom in the country.

Dion Nissenbaum was taken into custody on Dec. 27 by police at his Istanbul home, for allegedly violating a ban on publishing images from an Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) video, the newspaper said on its website, Although the paper provided no further details, ISIL jihadists last week shared a video purportedly showing two Turkish soldiers captured in Syria being burned alive.

Ankara said earlier this week there was no confirmation of the ISIL claims.

The 49-year-old American correspondent was held for two-and-a-half days without access to lawyers or contact with his family, the WSJ said, adding for most of the period, it “couldn’t determine” his location.  
  
His detention comes a day after one of Turkey’s best-known investigative journalists, Ahmet Şık, was charged with “making terror propaganda.”

Istanbul police authorities had no immediate reaction to the WSJ report.

Nissenbaum said he was “physically comfortable and treated well” during his time in a detention center outside Istanbul.

He was released on Dec. 30 and has now left Turkey for the United States accompanied by his family, the WSJ added.