TheCable

Turkish citizens could face up to three years in jail for spreading ‘fake news’, owing to a new law ratified by the country’s parliament.

The law, proposed by Recep Erdogan, Turkey’s president, was passed on Thursday to “safeguard” the country’s forthcoming elections in June 2023.

The controversial disinformation bill has been in the works since 2021 and on May 17, 2022, reviews of the country’s controversial disinformation bill were finalised. As of May 26, the bill had already worked its way through the parliament.

While some critics and lawmakers say the bill is yet another attempt to stifle freedom of speech and the press, Turkey argues that laws are needed to crack down on misinformation and false accusations on social media, saying it is not designed to silence the opposition.

Burak Erbay, a member of the opposition Republican People’s Party, smashed his phone with a hammer while speaking in parliament in protest of the law.

“I would like to address my brothers who are 15, 16, 17 years old and who will be deciding the fate of Turkey in 2023,” Erbay said.

“You have only one freedom left — the phone in your pocket. There’s Instagram, YouTube, Facebook. You communicate there.

“If the law here passes in parliament, you can break your phone like this.”

Article 29 of the bill says those who spread false information online about Turkey’s security to “create fear and disturb public order” will face a prison sentence of one to three years.

The country’s new disinformation bill also requires social networks and internet sites to hand over personal details of users suspected of “propagating misleading information”.

In the annual media freedom index published earlier this year by Reporters Without Borders (RSF), Turkey was rated 149th out of 180 nations.

Turkey, once the world’s worst jailer of journalists, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), is now ranked sixth in the CPJ census after releasing 20 prisoners in the last year.