By Atty.Kerim Kalkan on Aug 26, 2007 | Reply

Press Statement by Adnan Oktar’s Legal Representative Kerim Kalkan Regarding the Blocking of WordPress.com in Turkey

As known by the public, access from Turkey to the blog service “WordPress.com,” which permits Internet users to launch blogs free of charge, has been halted by a court decision. This ruling went into effect on August 17, 2007, and thus all access from Turkey to WordPress.com and its subsites have been blocked. The reason for this decision is the service in question’s imposing no limits on illegal blog publications, its refusal to consider demands that these be stopped and a disregard of Turkish court decisions to the effect that the activities of specific subsites be halted.

Ill-intentioned people turned to the service in question because of the free and unsupervised opportunities it offers, and WordPress.com quickly turned into the mouthpiece and publishing center of separatist-destructive ideologies, personal hostilities and illegal objectives. It must first and foremost be made clear that everyone has a duty to respect the decisions of the independent Turkish courts. Freedom of the press does not mean freedom to insult other people. It is not the freedom to attack the fundamental values of the Turkish state, the principles of the Republic, or our unity and union. WE BELIEVE IN FREE SPEECH, HOWEVER WE DO NOT BELIEVE IN FREE INSULT AND FREE DEFAMATION. Everyone is free to express and defend his or her views on all subjects, but everyone also has a responsibility to remain within the bounds of criticism, with a respect for personal rights and without damaging the public order. It is inarguable that those who transgress these bounds will be prevented from doing so by the Judiciary.
About twenty requests had been made by us to the management of the site in question asking that illegal publications be halted, but the management took absolutely no precautionary measures. Following the requests issued by us regarding only the subsites that violated my client’s individual rights, the Turkish courts made a large number of rulings to terminate the illegal subsites publishing under WordPress.com. These were forwarded to the head office of the firm in question and this time it was demanded that they cease carrying illegal publications, in line with the decisions issued by the the courts of the Turkish Republic. However, despite all the written and verbal petitions made, the firm in question refused to recognize our demands and the decisions of the courts of the Turkish Republic and persisted in refusing to implement them.

WordPress.com was then reminded that a blind eye would never be turned to refusal to implement the decisions of the Turkish courts, and that so long as they failed to act on these, the access from Turkey to all WordPress.com publications would be blocked. As a result of their failure to heed this final warning, the access from Turkey to all publications of WordPress.com, which had failed to act on the court decisions, was banned under a new judicial ruling.

Nobody has the privilege of refusing to implement court rulings. Judicial decrees are there to be acted upon. Every state has the right to take appropriate measures to ensure that the rulings of its own judicial bodies are implemented.

Turkish judicial bodies have the right to take and implement measures to neutralize the illegal resistance of legal or actual entities refusing to act on Turkish court rulings. The institutions of the state will obviously not leave Turkish citizens unprotected in the face of attacks by those harboring hostile intentions.

Therefore, the decision to block a blog service that refused to abide by the previous court rulings and that left illegalities unsanctionable is a correct, rightful and exemplary one.

There are lessons that all blog systems and internet service providers need to learn from this court ruling. Blog systems, particularly those that offer its services making no charges, must be on their guard against blogs that engage in illegal activities through their systems. They must not remain indifferent to the complaints reaching them, and still less to judicial rulings. Otherwise, such service providers will inevitably face the same sanctions as those imposed on WordPress.com.

Bloggers, on the other hand, must be careful when selecting service providers. Rather than choosing at random, they should select one that respects the law, human rights and the rulings of the judiciary. By doing so they will ensure that their own publishing can continue without interruption, and blog systems will be obliged to behave in accordance with the laws and regulations. In this way, both freedom of information and individual rights can be preserved. If somebody starts such an insult campaign towards you, would you stay quiet and let them do so? If everybody started such a campaign for everybody, how would the Internet be?

We respectfully submit this for the public’s information.

Adnan Oktar’s Legal Representative
Atty. Kerim Kalkan Asst. Atty. Ceyhun Gokdogan(Istanbul Barr register number: 27405)

Address: Darulaceze Caddesi, Bilas Is Merkezi, A Blok, D:5, Okmeydani Sisli Istanbul

Phone: 90-212-220 31 20
Fax: 90-212-220 74 21
E-mail: rotahukuk@rotahukuk.com
cgokdogan@istanbulbarosu.org.tr

By RLTJ on Sep 22, 2007 | Reply

People sell ideas. Some do not want others to sell besides theirs. It makes them look ugly. By blocking others they hope to monopolize. And ironic, most of them claim they are for democracy. To them I say why do they sell trash?

Rod

By RLTJ on Sep 23, 2007 | Reply

My point was, people who read know what is sense and what is non-sense, what is sane and what is insane. Everybody should be allowed to sell…It is the buyers that count.

I guess there are people who ackowledge deep with in them that they are selling inferior ideas if not trash. Hoping to sell theirs they resort to…I dont know what to call it.

Democracy is not without defenses. There is slander and libel if they are the case, not necessarily clamping freedom of speech.

By RLTJ on Sep 24, 2007 | Reply

Dear Administrator,
DON’T BLOCK THE BLOG

DBTB is the latest addition to my sub-Favorites, entitled “My visits”. I got it from Rasheedworld.blogspot. The appeal by Atty.Kerim Kalkan was interesting.

Other than Elmas Bektas – Ruffa Guttierez, and some western movies of Turkish settings, I know little about Turkey.

Atty.Kerim Kalkan gave me the impressions that his government, inutile against what it decided to be Insult and Defamation by one subject to another, has now resorted to blanket arrest of freedom of expression. If Turkey government can do that to WordPress, the question in my mind is, is not it doing the same thing in Turkish press, too?

So, Turkey has a problem with separatists and slanderers. What people say in the net is reality. By banishing them in the net does not make them imaginary. They are still out there somewhere SAYING THE SAME THINGS abhorable to Atty.Kerim Kalkan. In democracy people have the right to project themselves as fools if that is the case.

That the public is buying, or will buy, trash ideas is under-estimation of the public. Instead of barring his antagonists, had not it benefited Atty.Kerim Kalkan if he simply placed beside other people’s statement, superior ideas like why they should not separate or show why they are wrong? By the turn of event, it appears to me that he has none. Like, he has run out of reasons.

To outsiders like me, what Atty.Kerim Kalkan states are mere allegations. “Destructive”, “insult” or “defamation” coming from anybody is subject to scrutiny since it is just one side of it. They are debatable, as a lawyer he knows that. People need to see both sides to know who is talking sense and who has got substance. In politics it is the public that finally determines what is what and not the speakers. By the turn of event, this is becoming impossible to see from here.

Now, I don’t think I should even make a peek at any legal publication made in Turkey should they come my way; take things therein seriously.

Clamping down on publication is obsolete. Society is naturally self regulating. In Metro Manila, for example, we have dailies that sell well while others sell less. To that, we have others which had gone defunct – that, I guess, is the result of selling what readers see as trash. People can no longer be hoodwinked and twisted.

One thing universal with people everywhere, they all hate fascism and tyranny. People displaying such tendencies, or construed as such, are already PRE-JUDGE. They have positioned themselves toward the losing end.

By the way, the part that says Your comment is awaiting moderation usually found in blogsites are, I think, open to abuse. I understand that everybody works for one cause or another. I had been moderated out not a few times in blogs of movements who claim that they are progressive and democratic. Moderating out differing view is anti-democratic.

And there are blogs that run diagonal or counter to my views which I still keep on patronizing today. I like their honesty to themselves and their commitment to freedom of expression.

Rodolfo Luis T Jardiolin
Metro Manila, Philippines

By RLTJ on Nov 3, 2007 | Reply

Hi

You have moderated me out once.

You mentioned religion and evolution and thus my comment. Sometimes I see reasons why I should comment unrecognized. In that particular comment, reason is some of my personal associates might wander into this site and find things I say horrible to them.

I dont say things in the net that I doubt that I cannot defend in public debate.

The comment was not intended against any faith. We are talking about religion and I cited christian religion.

I did not mention that I am a christian of the Roman Catholic denomination. In fact I would have been a priest if I did not dropped out of the Seminary.I could have cited Muslim faith if I were a Muslim but I am not and I do not know the Islamic faith, so religion there is realloy incidental.

I still see myself as a Christian.

I guess your moderating out of that comment, on second thought, might have done me good. T.y.

More of me in rltjs.wordpress.com