Three Turkish Cypriot journalists threatened in north

The Turkish Cypriot Journalists’ Union (Ktgb) said that three journalists were threatened by a family member of a defendant while reporting on a trial at Kyrenia district court on Friday.

“Threats and obstruction attempts towards journalists whose only purpose is to inform the public with the news they are doing continued on the first working day of the new year,” the union wrote in a Facebook statement.

Ktgb said that the journalists Omer Kadiroglu from the newspaper Diyalog, Devrim Demir from Ahbap and Ahmet Karagozlu from the TV channel Genc were prevented from taking pictures and recording videos of the trial.

A family member of the defendant is said to have approached the journalists, threatening them by saying they would “see what awaits them.”

The journalists later filed a complaint with the police.

“Although we were faced with similar incidents last year and we want police to be more sensitive on this issue, the continuing threats is quite thought-provoking and a demonstration of how much press freedom is under threat,” the union said.

It emphasised that preventing journalists from doing their work was a direct attack on the freedom of expression, the public right to information and press freedom, stressing that journalists were the voice of the public.

“Trying to silence this responsibility by threat and repression is never acceptable,” the union concluded it’s post.

Friday’s alleged threats follow a series of similar incidents in which Turkish Cypriot journalists reported being intimidated over the previous year, with some saying they were threatened with violence.

In late November 2025, the editor in-chief of the north’s Ozgur Gazete newspaper, Pinar Barut, said that she received death threats targeting both herself and her family, allegedly as part of an extortion attempt.

Turkish Cypriot journalist Aysemden Akin in May 2025 reported receiving similar threats after publishing a series of articles containing allegations of a deep money-laundering and smuggling network operating in Cyprus, involving several powerful men in Turkey.

The threats followed after her interviewee, Cemil Onal, who had made accusations of an alleged Erdogan-Cyprus corruption ring, was shot dead in the Netherlands

In September, Turkish Cypriot journalist Canan Onurer claimed that she had received death threats for refusing to retract a report on Turkish nationals allegedly involved in criminal activity on the island.