Talkin' Turkey: PM Threatens Times of London with Legal Action

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A month after branding Twitter  a "provocateur" (see "TUOL" post 6/26/13), Turkey's Prime Minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan has the Times of London in his sites, threatening the daily with legal action over a full-page political ad criticizing him for his "dictatorial rule," Al-Jazeera reported today.

Hollywood's Susan Sarandon and Sean Penn are among the signatories in the ad that objects to the PM's handling of anti-government demonstrations and blames Erdogan for the deaths of five protesters. Demonstrators, whom the PM has condemned as "terrorists" and "looters," are demanding his ouster.

"We will pursue legal channels regarding the Times," Erdogan is quoted as saying in the Al-Jazeera. It's puzzling to "TUOL" what Erdogan believes is being 'broadcast' on such legal channels that would give rise to an actionable claim against the daily for running a paid advertisement.

Cower of London: Times Slashes 20 Editorial Positions

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Shrinking circulation and vanishing ad revenues apparently are a problem across the pond, too, as the News Corp.-owned Times of London announced 20 editorial staffers are being pink-slipped, according to a story in The Guardian (www.guardian.co.uk).

Citing the scheduled end-of-the-month break-up by News Corp. of its newspaper, book publishing, television and film entities into two separate companies, acting Times Editor John Witherow warned that News International, publisher of the Times and Sunday Times, no longer can rely on receiving subsidies from better-performing media outlets, such as the tabloid Sun with its daily page 3 pinup of topless young women, according to The Guardian article. 

The layoffs will reduce the Times editorial staff by just under 10 percent. Witherow dismissed talk of any merger of the editorial staffs of the Times and Sunday Times. Times' newspapers sustained total losses of 28.7 million pounds ($44,760,993) for the fiscal year ending July 1, 2012, compared to a year earlier, when red ink added up to 11.8 million pounds ($18,408,120).

Roughly a hundred editorial positions were eliminated in 2011 by the Times and Sunday Times combined.