Turkey has made headlines recently regarding their policies in responding to leaked recordings of private conversations between major politicians, including the Prime Minister himself. Those conversations were posted on social media sites, which led to a government crackdown in an effort to prevent more leaked information. A few weeks ago, just before the March 30th local elections, Twitter was blocked throughout Turkey. The site is back up and running now due to a court ruling, but that was not before the government blocked YouTube as well. YouTube, however, is still blocked. Corruption allegations within the government are running rampant and have been since the conversations were leaked back in December. Arrests are being made and Turkish politicians have been partially blaming outside governments, namely the U.S. for alleged interfering.
Because of all that has been going on, the current U.S. Ambassador to Turkey, Francis Ricciardone, gave an interview today with a Turkish-owned, English language newspaper, Hurriyet Daily News. In the interview, Mr Ricciardone answers key questions about Turkish-American relations, the U.S. government's view on their social media ban, and the hopeful future of Turkey. I thought the interview was important and worth sharing, so I'm linking it here. Please take a look if you have the time.
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