BBC Turkish Service is a unit within the BBC's World Service that broadcasts in Turkish. This service operates under the European and American Division of the BBC World Service, which includes broadcasts in many other languages โโin terms of its general broadcast line.
Turkish radio broadcasts began on November 20, 1939 and continued for approximately 71 years before being terminated in 2011 due to budget cuts. All programs broadcast during this period were collected under the name "Archive Room", transferred to digital media and made available to the audience. Programs usually started with short news bulletins, then continued with in-depth news files that covered the subject in detail and included interviews and opinions of experts in the field.
Current news summaries and programs were broadcast at 07.00 in the morning and 18.00 in the evening on weekdays, and only at 18.00 in the evening on weekends. Topics related to Turkey's nearby geography, such as Cyprus, the European Union and Iraq, were also frequently included in the broadcast flow.
BBC Turkish's financing is covered by the license fees paid by households that own televisions in the UK, in line with the BBC's general revenue model. The budget of the World Service is covered by the British Ministry of Foreign Affairs from state resources, and keeping these two sources separate is related to the creation of a special financial structure for foreign broadcasting activities since the establishment of the BBC. This situation does not negatively affect the editorial independence of the publications in any way.
Today, all content of BBC Turkish is easily accessible over the internet. This includes not only written news and analysis, but also photographs, audio recordings and video content. Video content is shared, especially through BBC Turkish's YouTube channel, in the form of interview-oriented file news and archive materials.
In addition, the Turkish version of the BBC Journalism Academy is also available online, and topics such as the basic principles of journalism, impartiality and language use are discussed in detail with course videos prepared by experienced journalists.
