In the wake of the deadly attack on a Paris satirical newspaper over cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad, a Turkish court has ordered a ban on specific Facebook pages that include material denigrating the Muslim prophet.
Ankara’s Golbasi Duty Magistrate Court decided that Facebook will be blocked entirely in Turkey if the social media network fails to comply with the ban, the state-run Anadolu Agency reported Sunday.
The court’s ruling was the latest measure enacted by an increasingly Islamist government under President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
Earlier this month, Hurriyet Daily News reported, Turkish police stopped trucks leaving Turkish newspaper Cumhuriyet’s printworks to inspect the daily’s content and make sure it didn’t run the cartoon showing the Prophet Muhammad from the front page of Charlie Hebdo.
The magazine became a symbol of free speech and anti-terrorism earlier in the month after two Islamist gunmen killed 12 people at its Paris offices to “avenge” the publication of cartoons considered disrespectful to the Prophet Muhammad.
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A subsequent issue, featuring another caricature of Muhammad, quickly sold out across France and elsewhere while also sparking massive rallies against the publication in Muslim countries.
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