Azadiya Welat (Kurdish for: "Freedom of the Country") was a newspaper in theKurdish language published inTurkey. It was shut down on 28 August 2016 when police raided the newspaper's headquarters inDiyarbakir, taking all 27 staff into custody.[1]
The paper was first published as a weekly newspaper with the nameWelat inIstanbul on 22 February 1992.[2] In 1996 it began to be published with its current name,Azadiya Welat.[2] In 2003 the headquarters of the paper moved from Istanbul toDiyarbakır.[2] In 2006 it became a daily newspaper.[2]
Itseditor-in-chief was sentenced to 3 years in prison in 2010.[3] A journalist who was distributingAzadiya Welat was murdered in 2014.[4]
Kurdish inmates in some Turkish jails were not allowed to receive the newspaper in 2007.[5] This interdiction is justified by a reference to the law no. 5275.[6] In 2015, theEuropean Court of Human Rights rules the unpredictability of how the law is applied is a violation of article 10 of theConvention.[5]
