Turkey warned on freedom of speech by EU
Turkey was told on Monday by the European Union that it had to safeguard freedom of expression in the country as a “matter of urgency†amid diminishing expectations that Ankara’s stalled membership bid can be revived.
The Turkey warned on freedom of speech by EU article by Aral Balkan, unless otherwise expressly stated, is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 2.0 UK: England License.
Ozgur
Hi Aral. There is contradiction about “freedom of speech” in EU; Assume that I am from Venedic, and I say, “All people in Venedic are liars”, then this statement is contradiction. Likewise, assume that I am from EU, and say that “All EU countries (including France
)allow freedom of speech “. All I am trying to say is EU politicians are contradicting with themselves by demanding things from others that EU don’t have.
October 17th, 2006 at 12:34 amEUcitizen
Nice steps Ozgur! You use an old EUropean paradox, formulated by Greeks 2500 years ago. It seems you are getting closer to European thinking.
There is a great difference though from “insulting Turkishness” to “genocide denial”.
For those who have read History Turkishness is itself an insult, as Nazism etc. You cannot insult an insult unless you have not yet joined the Western way of thinking.
The case of genocide denial is an altogether different matter. What Turks did was a genocide, and the Germans did the same (remember Hitler invoking the Armenian Genocide?). The Germans admitted guilt, paid very handsome compensations and feel proud to have made this gesture.
I think you should feel better if you do it yourselves as the Germans did.
There is no contradiction in EU demanding that you abolish all the laws against freedom of speech! You cannot put Pamuk, Dink, many intellectuals, many Kurds on trial invoking “insulting Turkishness”
In EUropean eyes it is not only a major violation of basic Human Rights, it is also a reminder of how far the Turkish mindset lies from the Western mindset.
November 20th, 2007 at 8:42 am