A Turkish court has blocked online access to multiple news reports and social media posts about a far-right party official who is standing trial on charges of assaulting a woman and breaking her nose, citing “national security and public order,” the Birgün daily reported.
The ruling by the Kayseri 1st Criminal Court of Peace was made on Monday at the request of defendant Enes Ertuğrul Kalın, the provincial chair in the central province of Kayseri for the far-right Nationalist Movement Party (MHP), and targeted reporting published on January 30 by BirGün, Sözcü, T24 and Yeniçağ as well as social media posts by journalists Nurcan Gökdemir and İsmail Arı.
Arı wrote on X that the court ordered the access bans on reports about Kalın’s trial so that “no one knows and no one sees.”
The blocked content was related to reporting that said Kalın was being tried over allegations that he beat a woman and broke her nose. The court said the access ban was issued on grounds of safeguarding national security and public order.
Kalın is being prosecuted over allegations that he assaulted a woman on April 12, 2025, and broke her nose. The Kayseri Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office prepared an indictment against him on charges of intentional injury. The case was accepted by the Kayseri 28th Criminal Court of First Instance on January 15, 2026.
According to the T24 news website, the woman, 39, told police she was attacked on the street and that Kalın punched and kicked her, while two other men tried to force her into a vehicle and took her phone.
A forensic report issued by Erciyes University’s medical faculty said her nose was fractured as a result of the assault, the indictment said.
Kalın denied the accusations in his statement to investigators, saying he did not know the woman and did not hit or threaten her.
Prosecutors cited evidence including camera footage and medical documentation and said the suspect’s denials were not credible. The first hearing is scheduled for April 15.
Turkey has frequently used court-ordered access bans to restrict online content, including news reports, under legal provisions that allow judges to block access on broad grounds such as public order and national security. Turkish courts blocked access to 3,300 URLs in first seven months of 2025.
