Reporters Without Borders (RSF) has ranked Turkey 159th out of 180 countries in the 2025 World Press Freedom Index, citing ongoing pressure against journalists in the country.
New index shows further decline
Turkey, which had climbed seven places last year due to “worse” conditions in neighboring countries, has now lost another position in the 2025 Index due to national conditions that disregard media freedom, remaining in the “very bad” category.
Turkey ranked 99th in 2002. It subsequently fell to 151st in 2016, 155th in 2017, and as low as 157th in 2018 and 2019. In 2020 it was 154th, in 2021 it was 153rd, in 2022 it was 149th, in 2023 it reached 165th, and in 2024 it was shown at 158th place.
Önderoğlu: Turkish media must not fall victim to single-voice control
RSF’s Turkey representative Erol Önderoğlu has reported that they view Turkey’s uncontrolled decline in the index with concern.
Önderoğlu, who points out that Turkish media has regressed in the index due to economic factors just like media worldwide, said: “Factors such as discriminatory government support of media capital through advertisements, arbitrary financial penalties targeting critical media outlets, and lack of support for independent media revenue models in the digital age have brought Turkish media to a concerning vulnerability in recent years. Journalism, exhausted from ongoing legal and physical pressures, after being deprived of democratic regulations and guarantees for a long time, is now also weakened by the blow of economic instability. The danger we face is a single-voice media.”
Economic weakness of media is a major threat
While physical attacks against journalists are the most visible aspect of attacks against press freedom, more insidious economic pressures also create major obstacles. The economic indicator in the World Press Freedom Index has continued to decline in 2025, reaching an unprecedented critical threshold. As a result, the state of press freedom has for the first time fallen into the “difficult” category worldwide due to this factor.
Bocandé: Without economic independence, there can be no free press
RSF Publishing Director Anne Bocandé, who states that ensuring pluralistic, free and independent media requires stable and transparent financial conditions, said: “Without economic independence, there can be no free press. When media are financially strained, they may fall into ratings competition at the cost of compromising quality and become victims of oligarchs or public decision-makers who exploit them.”
Bocandé explains the emerging danger: “When journalists become impoverished, they no longer have the tools to stand up against enemies of the press who are champions of disinformation and propaganda. We need to re-establish a media economy that guarantees the nurturing of journalism and the production of reliable information, which is undoubtedly costly. Solutions exist, but their implementation on a broad scale appears necessary. Financial independence is a vital condition for guaranteeing free and reliable information that serves the public interest.”
Severe wave of media closures
According to data obtained by RSF for the 2025 Index, 160 out of the 180 countries evaluated (88.9%) have been unable to establish financial stability for their media organizations.
Even worse, across the globe, nearly a third of countries have seen economic difficulties lead to the closure of news organizations. Tunisia (down 11 places to 129th), Argentina (down 21 places to 87th), and Greece (89th) reflect this situation. Even countries like South Africa (27th) and New Zealand (16th) that rank relatively well are not immune to these difficulties. In Haiti (112, -18), the lack of political stability has also plunged the media economy into chaos.
Media closures have led to the exile of journalists in 34 countries. This is the case for Nicaragua (172, down 9 places), Belarus (166), Iran (176), and Afghanistan (175), where economic difficulties have been added to political pressures.
USA leads economic crisis
In the United States (57th; down 2 places), where the economic indicator has dropped by more than 14 points in two years, vast regions are turning into information deserts. Local journalism is paying the heavy price of economic recession: more than 60% of journalists and experts who participated in RSF’s survey in Arizona, Florida, Nevada, and Pennsylvania agree on the “difficulty of making a living as a journalist,” and 75% agree on the “struggle of economic viability for an average media organization.” The country’s 28-step drop in social ranking also reveals that the global media environment is becoming increasingly hostile to the press.
Donald Trump’s second term, in which false economic pretexts are being instrumentalized to bring the press to its knees, has already strengthened this observation: The US halting funding provided by the U.S. Agency for Global Media (USAGM) for some news organizations including Voice of America and Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty is an example of this. More than 400 million people worldwide were deprived of access to reliable information in a single day. Similarly, the freezing of international aid funds through the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) has pushed hundreds of media outlets into severe economic instability; particularly in Ukraine (62nd), some were forced to close.
Platform hegemony, media concentration
This situation further weakens the media economy, which has already been damaged by the dominance of GAFAM (Google, Apple, Facebook, Amazon, and Microsoft) in information distribution. These largely unregulated platforms are capturing an increasingly large portion of advertising revenues that would normally support journalism. Total spending on advertising on social platforms increased by 14% compared to 2023, reaching $247.3 billion in 2024. The digital platforms in question, besides undermining the business model of news media in this way, also cause the spread of manipulated or misleading content, thereby strengthening the phenomenon of disinformation.
In well-positioned countries like Australia (29th), Canada (21st), and Finland (5th), concentration in media ownership continues to be a concern. In France (25th, down 4 places), eight wealthy individuals hold about 20 press organizations that account for 81% of the circulation of national newspapers and 95% of national weekly publication circulation. This increased concentration in ownership not only limits editorial diversity but also increases the risk of self-censorship and raises serious questions about truly protecting editorial independence against the economic or political interests of shareholders.
A map increasingly turning red
In the RSF Index, the situation in 42 countries representing more than half of the world’s population (56.7%), where press freedom has completely disappeared or journalism is dangerous, is rated as “very bad.” This is the case in Palestine (163rd), where the Israeli army has been decimating journalism for more than 18 months: The Israeli army has killed nearly 200 news organization workers, at least 43 of whom were on duty, and imposed a media blackout in the besieged area. Israel dropped 11 places in the index and is shown at 112th place.
As three East African countries, Uganda (143rd), Ethiopia (145th), and Rwanda (146th) have fallen into the “very bad” category this year. Hong Kong (140th) has now taken on the same red color as China (178th, -6), which has joined North Korea (179th) and Eritrea (180th) in the bottom three of the ranking. In Central Asia, Kyrgyzstan (144th) and Kazakhstan (141st) cast a shadow over the region. In the Middle East, Jordan (147th) has fallen 15 places due to laws restricting press freedom.
Source:
Botan Times Reporters Without Borders (RSF)
05/03/2025
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