Interpretation English-Turkish
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P24 (the Platform for Independent Journalism in Turkey) was founded three years ago to promote press integrity and quality journalism in a country where that has been under threat. It does so through a variety of strategies that includes advocacy, training and content production. Its many projects include SUSMA – an anti-censorship platform and it produces K24, the highly regarded on-line literary review. P24 works with a large variety of European partners and has the support of many EU member states. While its main mission is to defend journalism, latterly it has found itself defending journalists themselves in circumstances where media organisations are shut down and colleagues put behind bars.
Veysel Ok is one of Turkey’s foremost legal advocates of press freedom. He is a graduate of Istanbul Law Faculty with a higher degree from the Department of Public Law in Marmara University and served as a lawyer with Taraf newspaper for 5 years. More recently he has been working with P24 in the defence of journalists and news organisations and has taken on public interest cases where freedom of expression is at stake. He has a long list of clients including some of Turkey’s most notable journalists including Hasan Cemal, Ahmet Altan Cengiz Çandar, Perihan Mağden, Şahin Alpay, and has also represented a large number of university academics.
Andrew Finkel has been a correspondent based in Turkey for over 25 years. During that time he has worked for a large variety of publications including The Economist, TIME, The Times, CNN and The New York Times. More unusually, he has worked in Turkish language media both in television and as a columnist for several newspapers. These experiences prompted him to become one of the founders of P24 to work for media integrity. Finkel has had fellowships at the University of Michigan and at the National Endowment for Democracy. He is the author of Turkey: What Everyone Needs to Know published by OUP and a position paper on Captured News Media: the Case of Turkey for CIMA (available online).