Dairy Company YÖRSAN Advocates for Internet Censorship

The Yörsan Food Products Co. Inc. calls the EmekDunyasi.net ('Labour World') website to withdraw their online publications related to the Yörsan resistance in 2008. Otherwise, Yörsan is going to take legal measures against the website.

EmekDunyasi.net had posted the news about 400 Yörsan workers on their website, who were made redundant by the dairy company because of their membership in the union. The website furthermore reported about the following joint struggle of the workers and the Tobacco, Alcoholic Beverages and Food Subsidiary Workers Union of Turkey (Tek Gıda-İş).

In a written statement signed by Yörsan official Taner Çalışkan on 20 May 2010, the company demanded the website to remove the related news from the site within two days. The demand was based on Law No. 5651 on "Regulation of Publications on the Internet and Suppression of Crimes Committed by means of Such Publication".

Company's worry: brand equity and reputation...

According to the company, the news published in 2008 "do not comply with the actual current situation" and also "the topic's actuality needs to be considered". Thus, Yörsan demands to have the news removed.

Yörsan claims to act on behalf of "commercial prominence" and "protecting the brand equity worth billions of Turkish Lira". The company declared to take legal measures in case the contents will not be removed.

EmekDunyasi.net: We will not remove our news

An EmekDunyasi.net official said in an announcement made on 3 June that a company worried about their brand equity should especially respect the right to be unionized as a constitutional right. "We are certainly not going to remove the news related to Yörsan from our archives", the website official said.

"Considering the news we published, there is not the slightest doubt about the correctness and the appropriateness regarding journalistic principles. We stand by all our news published since the foundation of our site in August 2007", EmekDunyası.net declared. (EÖ/VK)