Yavuz Baydar is the Editor-in-Chief of Ahval, a trilingual independent online news site focussing on Turkey. Since the attempted coup of July 15, 2016, he has lived in exile in Europe.
Baydar was among the co-founders of the independent media platform P24, which aimed to monitor the media sector and the state of journalism in Turkey.
Turkey’s first news ombudsman, Baydar began at at Milliyet daily in 1999 and worked in the same role as reader representative until 2014. His work included addressing reader complaints and commenting on media ethics. Working in a tough professional climate had its costs: he was twice forced to leave his job, after his critical columns on journalistic failings and fabricated news stories. He served as president of the U.S. based International Organizaton of News Ombudsmen in 2003.
In 2014, as a Shorenstein Fellow at the Harvard Kennedy School of Government, Baydar completed an extensive research paper on self-censorship, the corruption of ownership in the Turkish media, state oppression and threats to journalism in Turkey in the wake of Gezi Park protests.
His opinion articles have appeared in The Guardian, The New York Times, El Pais, Svenska Dagbladet, Yomiuri Shimbun, The Arab Weekly, and The Index on Censorship.
