DISTURBING

Three German Journalists Reportedly Kicked Out of Turkey

Germany's foreign minister has criticized the Turkish government's decision.

Three German journalists were kicked out of Turkey after government officials refused to grant them press accreditation, according to the BBC. Two of them left Turkey on Sunday, and the other has already returned to Germany. The journalists include Thomas Seibert, a reporter from Tagesspiegel and one-time contributor to The Daily Beast; Jörg Brase, a bureau chief for ZDF; and Halil Gülbeyaz, who’s with NDR TV. Turkey has jailed dozen of domestic journalists over flimsy allegations that they’re linked to an attempted coup in 2016. But Turkish officials’ recent decision may be the first time foreign journalists have been denied accreditation, per the BBC. Germany's foreign minister, Heiko Maas, reportedly slammed Turkey’s decision as “unacceptable.” “Without a critical press there is no free democracy,” Maas stated. “We will keep campaigning for journalists to be able to work without restrictions, in Turkey as elsewhere.” Turkey jailed two German-Turkish journalists in 2017, spurring a diplomatic crisis, ABC News notes. One journalist was detained for one year, and the other was freed in August.

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