THY magazine fined for censoring article criticizing an alcohol ban

ISTANBUL

Writer Buket Uzuner has won a case against THY’s in-flight magazine.

Writer Buket Uzuner has won a case against a magazine distributed only in Turkish Airlines (THY) flights, for the censoring of her article criticizing an alcohol ban imposed by the Istanbul Municipality in Moda, daily Hürriyet reported yesterday.

After seeing that her article about the Moda neighborhood in Istanbul had been censored in the June 2009 edition of Skylife, the in-flight magazine on THY flights, Uzuner sent an e-mail to the magazine. The reply stated that the article was partly censored as it was about alcohol, according to daily Hürriyet.

Uzuner’s lawyer then sued THY A.Ş. for censoring her article without permission. The censored part of the article criticized the Istanbul Municipality’s ban on the sale of alcohol in Moda. THY lawyers claimed that the censoring was decided on to protect the image of the country. A section of the article praising a restaurant was also censored. THY lawyers claimed that the aim was to remove any advertisement.

The court decided in favor of Uzuner, ruling that the article, titled “An Istanbul classic on the Anatolian side: Moda,” was a literary work. It also decided to cancel the June 2009 edition of Skylife and republish the article’s entire version.