20 March 2024
The Constitutional Court ruled that the rights to freedom of expression and of the press of Aydın Gelleci, the managing editor of the regional daily Günebakış, were unlawfully restricted.
In a unanimous decision made public on 20 March 2024, the Court ordered that the journalist be paid 10,000 TL in non-pecuniary damages and 19,000 TL in court costs.
The Court found a violation in the obligation imposed on the journalist to publish a correction and reply concerning his column titled “The President Did Not Say Anything New,” published on 26 March 2018, following the rulings of Trabzon 2nd and 1st Criminal Judgeships of Peace.
In its judgment on the application filed on 13 June 2018, the Court stated: “The applicant was forced to publish irrelevant content that did not correspond to the allegations in the article, in other words, elements that were not technically of the nature of correction and reply. It has not been possible to accept that such an interference with freedom of the press corresponded to a pressing social need.”
