Twitter withholds scores of tweets after Turkish court ruling on journalists

Twitter has withheld scores of tweets from Turkish journalists and media outlets, after a court ruling issued over a complaint filed by a judge on the grounds that his personal rights were damaged by a news story shared through the social media platform.

The withheld tweets include those posted by well-known columnists including Nazl? Il?cak and reporters such as Fatih Ya?mur, formerly a correspondent for daily Radikal.

Tweets posted by daily newspaper Bugün and the daily news website gercekgundem.com are also among the withheld content.

The decision came after the Istanbul 6th Criminal Court of Peace ordered Twitter to block the tweets over a complaint filed by Bekir Altun, the judge of the Istanbul 1st Criminal Court of Peace. Altun had claimed in the Jan. 14 petition to the court that a news article shared hundreds of times on Twitter breached his personal rights.

According to the original news story reported by Fatih Ya?mur, Altun admitted to having allowed an allegedly illegal wiretapping by the police, before refusing to preside over the subsequent trial as the "plot" was uncovered.

Dozens of high-ranking police officials were detained in simultaneous operations in July 2014, as part of an investigation into accusations against the "parallel state," a movement allegedly led by the U.S.-based Islamic cleric Fethullah Gülen, the Turkish government's ally-turned-nemesis.

According to the arrest warrants, the officers had begun a prank investigation into the so-called "Selam-Tevhid" organization to wiretap 251 unrelated people since 2010. Their trial has been a matter of debate with many of its aspects, including the withdrawal of its first judge, Altun.

Merely sharing news

Many of the...