Islamist/Creationist Adnan Oktar Blocked CNN Blog in Turkey
AKP Watch September 2nd, 2007
AKP Watch is sick and tired to write posts about Adnan Oktar, but he is not tired to seek court orders to ban bloggers in Turkey. It’s look like Oktar committed to be an internet celebrity, even his fame will surpass famous Mahir of 99’s.
Bad news arrived as Jim Collela wrote on his blog: [CORRECTED] “the CNN Political Ticker Blog and Flickr Blog are also blocked because of the same court order (decision no.: 2007/195) enacted by Adnan Oktar.”
AKPWatch double checked and now it’s confirmed, the CNN Blog is also affected by the recent block of WordPress by AK Party connected Islamist/Creationist cult leader Adnan Oktar (a.k.a Harun Yahya). Oktar, acting like a proxy to AK Party, obtained a court order to block WordPress in Turkey which effected all WordPress powered sites, even the ones not using wordpress.com domain name, such as CNN Political Ticker and Yahoo owned Flickr Blog.
Adnan Oktar and his infamous creationist nonsense is very populer among AK Party circles, even an AK Party’s Gaziantep MP Ahmet Uzer distributed Oktar’s 800 pages Creationist book to member of parliments. (Source: mainstream turkish newspapers, Radikal on 27/02/07, Sabah on 03/03/07, Vatan on 02/03/07)
When MP Ahmet Uzer defended himself, he unintentionally revealed that Oktar’s creationist book –Atlas of Creation- approved by Ministry of Culture and Turism as a scientific book. (Source: OlayMedya)
Moreover AK Party officals decided that Adnan Oktar books will be purchased by all public libraries in Turkey. Currently legendary even poet Nazim Hikmet’s book are banned in public libraries in Turkey. (Source: Hurriyet on 03/02/07 and Hurriyet on 13/01/07)
Oktar and his famous book is favored among AK Party elements, for example, AKP appointed governors writes recommendation letters to distribute the book in the schools, multiple AK Party municipals including Ankara and Istanbul provides exhibition areas, childred from primary schools brought to those exhibitions, and more surprisingly Istanbul Governor approves Oktar aide to teach creationism seminars in schools (Source: mainstream Turkish newspapers, Hurriyet on 25/06/2006 and Radikal on 11/03/2007)
The fourth largest blogging platform in the world, WordPress, still remains banned in Turkey since 15th of August 2007.
- AK Party , AKP , Adnan Oktar , Censorship , Free Speech , Freedom of Press , Harun Yahya , Islamist , Turkey
- Comments(9)
Merhaba AKPWatch,
I’m flattered you are paying attention to my WordPress (WP) blog, and all of the posts I’ve filed since this absurd ban began. But I have to disagree on one single point. And that is: I DID NOT WRITE “that CNN Blog is also [a]ffected by the recent block of WordPress by AK Party connected Islamist/Creationist cult leader Adnan Oktar (a.k.a Harun Yahya).” I wrote that the CNN Political Ticker Blog and Flickr Blog are also blocked because of the same court order (decision no.: 2007/195) enacted by Adnan Oktar. The point here is that I never wrote that Adnan Oktar IS CONNECTED TO the AK Party. Any connection is tenuous at best. That’s your view of it. I have no evidence that could prove that and wouldn’t write it unless I had. Maybe you have and should publish it.
On that score, your story about Gaziantep deputy Ahmet Uzer is interesting. I heard something about that. Though I hadn’t heard about the decision to put the (dreadful) “Atlas of Creation” into public libraries (why bother, it’s handed out for free on the street anyway!). If it is the case, as a “citizen journalism” tip, provide a link to a reputable news source if it was in one of the Turkish newspapers. Even if it’s in Turkish, the Turkish audience (affected by this ban in particular) could check that it is substantiated.
But please guys, don’t quote me out of context!
Dear Jim,
Thanks for your correction. We updated the post and quoted your orginal text only.
Now it’s clear that you reported only “CNN Political Ticker Blog and Flickr Blog are also blocked because of the same court order (decision no.: 2007/195) enacted by Adnan Oktar.” and nothing more. The rest is our point of view on this issue. I hope you enjoy additional links supporting our story, although they are in Turkish.
Regards,
AKP Watch
Dear AKPWatch,
Thanks for updating the story! Also, your “linkage” between AKP and Adnan Oktar is far more credible now… Even if it is in Turkish. I’m actually amazed how many Turkish WordPress (WP) bloggers, who are most affected by this ban, have excellent English too — unlike Adnan Oktar’ lawyers! One of the main reasons that WP were unaware the ban was coming was because their only notice was in badly-worded (in English) emails from Oktar’s lawyers which were spammed* to WP. Hardly a due process of law!
http://wordpress.com/blog/2007/08/19/why-were-blocked-in-turkey/
http://photomatt.net/2007/08/25/turkey-update/
I wish I could say the same for my Turkish! (Ama cok az.)
Perhaps you could follow up on something I can’t do quite yet… For example, many of these so-called “slander” blogs allegedly stemming from Edip Yuksel are full of details that have been published many times in the Turkish press. In other words, I have a strong hunch that they are based on fact. “Adnan Hoca” is well-known in Turkey for being in the headlines. Unfortunately, the outside (English-speaking) world knows very little about him. Perhaps you could show everybody just who this character, and therefore highlight how ridiculous this ban is, by translating some of those many press articles on this controversial character. A quick search in the Web site archives of Sabah, Hurriyet, Radikal brings up hundreds of stories… sex scandals, kidnap, blackmail, jailtime, slander of 6 professors in 1999 (who won their case), avoiding military service because of schizophrenia… it’s all out there!
Jim, I feel your pain, Türkçe çok zor.
AKP Watch, thanks for the update. I own a wordpress.com blog, and write often about Turkish politics.
Freedom of speech!
[...] 13th, 2007 by Michael van der Galiën AKP Watch has an interesting and good post up about the decision by a Turkish court to block (all access to) Wordpress. AKP Watch is sick and [...]
I’m also a blogger in Turkey using wordpress. It’s all pretty weird. I’ve found a way around the block (www.opendns.com) but not before I went through all the effort of opening a new site on independent web hosting. It’s all good. I don’t expect the ban to be lifted any time soon. All pretty embarasing for Turkey.
Not sure if you’re aware or whether it works, but apparently wordpress has
installed Google Adsense and duplicated (most) wordpress blogs on a
different domain. I am told it works for Turkish reader connecting to
wordpress from Turkey.
So, instead of using the domain: wordpress.com, you need to use
wordprexy.com.
Try it with this blog and please let me know if it works:
http://plateauofiran.wordprexy.com/
[...] that are critical of his works. Adnan Oktar is, of course, quite a well known figure in Turkey: he is a creationist who wrote a book dismissing darwinism. The title of this book is “Atlas of [...]
Adnan Oktar is just exploting Islam. Makeing money of believers in Turkey has become a money-makeing sector. True but sad.
http://eurasiaforum.de