Delivering a speech during the fourth TRT World Forum that was held virtually this year due to the coronavirus pandemic, Turkey's President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said: "Turkey's achievements in the international arena, the great changes in the country, are not fairly presented globally."
"In many cases, our achievements are even dismissed or distorted," he added.
Decrying the double standards under which members of the terrorist YPG/PKK who shed the blood of hundreds of thousands of civilians in Syria adorn the covers of "prestigious" Western magazines, Erdoğan said those who try to lecture Turkey on press freedom now act as the "three monkeys" of Europe, refusing to recognize the PKK's evil acts.
On a recently proposed French security law, under fire for violating press freedom and hindering efforts to stop police brutality, Erdoğan criticized the proposal, saying: "International media kept silent in the face of France's blockade on the media."
"They did not utter a single critical sentence regarding the French state organs' media blockade," he said.
France's ruling party on Monday withdrew the proposed law, saying the controversial sections would be reworked.
Erdoğan blasted a "similar double standard over Israeli security forces' actions against Palestinians, which are like state terrorism."
When Israeli soldiers tried to forcibly pull an injured Palestinian out of a Palestinian Red Crescent ambulance in the occupied West Bank, as captured by Anadolu Agency photographers, the international media paid the incident no notice, he said.
"When media outlets carry the banner of Islamophobia and xenophobia, this is shameful," Erdoğan said, likely referring to much-criticized cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad published by a French magazine.
"Ugly acts carried out under the guise of freedom of the press serve to poison the will to coexist among people of different religions and cultures. If discourteous attitudes shown under the guise of press freedom are not stopped, both Europe and all of humanity will suffer," he warned.
Erdoğan also stressed the impact of the coronavirus pandemic on every area of life, saying that the media, politics, and international relations are also being affected by the virus.
