Turkey revokes radio station for using term 'Armenian Genocide'

YEREVAN, JULY 4, ARMENPRESS. The Supreme Council of Radio and Television of Turkey has revoked the license of Açık Radio: the reason is the phrase "Armenian Genocide" said on the radio on April 24.

The Council had decided to fine the radio station and suspend its broadcasting for using the term "Armenian Genocide." It then canceled the station's license when Açık Radyo did not comply with the suspension order.

The council, consisting of nine members and dominated by representatives of the ruling Justice and Development Party, decided to close the radio station because it did not stop broadcasting the program, which, according to the council, violated the article "inciting hatred and hostility towards society or inciting hatred among the population, regardless of race, language, religion, gender, class, or sect."

The efforts of thirty years of radio broadcasting since 1995 are being nullified by one decision. The more democratic and open-minded intelligentsia of Turkey is worried, but not surprised, since the list of non-government media punished by the Supreme Council is long.

Since its very first day of establishment, Açık Radio has been defending fundamental human rights and freedoms, promoting multicultural life, relations between cultures and identities. The weekly AKOS has been broadcast on the radio for many years. To date, the radio has produced more than 1,200 programs on politics, sociology, psychology, culture, environmental protection and many other areas with the efforts of more than 1,300 volunteers.

The staff and management of the radio station will try to protect their rights by all legal means and oppose repression against freedom of the press.

Lilit Gasparyan