ANKARA: Facebook Inc. and Twitter Inc. said they would appeal a Turkish court’s order to remove images of a slain prosecutor that were deemed to abet terrorism, as the government tightened its grip over Internet access.
Facebook in the meantime complied with the ruling to escape a blockage of its services in Turkey, the company said in an e-mailed statement Monday.
Twitter and Google Inc.’s YouTube also couldn’t be accessed through some providers during the day. The ban on Twitter was lifted late Monday. YouTube said it was working to restore access for users in Turkey as soon as possible.
“Turkey is really damaging itself by laws that allows prosecutors to shut down Twitter, Facebook and YouTube,” Carl Bildt, formerly Sweden’s prime minister and a champion of Turkey’s bid to join the European Union, said on Twitter.
Turkey has passed several laws to strengthen control over the Internet since December 2013, after hundreds of tape recordings allegedly showing political corruption were posted on social media. The EU has has criticized Turkish government efforts to control Internet access as an attempt to curb freedom of speech.
The court ordered websites to remove photos of a prosecutor who was taken hostage in a courtroom by leftist militants, then died of wounds sustained during a police raid to free him. Several newspapers and websites published pictures of the prosecutor with a gun to his head, defying a government ban and outraging Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu.
Ibrahim Kalin, a spokesman for President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, said the ruling was demanded by a prosecutor who equated the distribution of images of his slain colleague with terrorist propaganda. He said the court ruling was “born of necessity” and wouldn’t infringe on civil liberties.
