The Guardian: Turkey’s Erdoğan wanted to publish an article after Kılıçdaroğlu's was published
Following the reactions received from public against the publishing of an op-ed article by Turkey’s Erdoğan in Britian’s one of the most prominent newpapers, The Guardian, Paul Chadwick responded to criticism in an article published on Saturday (July 22) with the title of ‘A byline for Erdoğan? Liberal megaphones for illeberal voices’.
Saying he had ‘asked relevant editors about their decision’ to publish Erdoğan’s piece or not, Chadwick explained that the reply he got was that it is part of the role of the team in The Guardian ‘to let the readers know what people in power are thinking’ and that ‘publishing his argument does not in any way legitimize his repression or imply the Guardian’s endorsement of his actions’.
Chadwick also mentioned that the leader of the main opposition CHP (Republican People’s Party), Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu, had got his piece published by The Guardian earlier – during his major Justice March – and said: “In recent months we have hosted numerous columns by international and Turkish writers condemning Erdoğan’s autocratic tendencies. We have also published
Amnesty International’s opinion on the crisis in Turkey. Just days before the first anniversary of the attempted coup, we ran an op-ed both online and in print by the head of the opposition, Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu. It was following this that the Turkish government approached us, arguing that the president should, for balance, be allowed to set out their thinking in the Guardian so readers could hear both sides as they marked the coup anniversary”.
“I substantially agree with the editors’ perspective. But not for all the same reasons. In this context – a foreign leader with constant media attention and many platforms at command – balance is not a weighty factor…Readers can be trusted to weigh the words of a politician like Erdoğan, with a record like his before and after the attempted coup, and to reach their own conclusions within the context of the coverage the Guardian and others continue to provide as Turkey and its neighbours convulse”, Chadwick concluded.