THE COVERAGE OF EU-TURKEY REFUGEE DEAL IN THE TURKISH ONLINE PRESS

Abstract

Turkey has played a significant role as a shelter for Syrian refugees whose number in the country has reached almost 3 million, the largest Syrian refugee population in the world. As a result of Turkey’s geographical and political position in Syrian migration issue and along with the in the face of the overwhelming flow of smuggled migrants and asylum seekers from Turkey to Greece, in 2016 Turkey and the EU signed the Refugee Deal which aims to stop irregular arrivals from Turkey to Greek islands by allowing Greece to return to Turkey those migrants. However, the deal has raised many concerns and questions from especially some Turkish and international institutions and rights groups. Among those questions are its fairness for migrants and asylum seekers, its legality, its ethics and its feasibility. In this context, taken into consideration that the news media has an impact on forming of public opinion so that on policy outcomes and implementation, this study aims to examine the coverage of the EU-Turkey Refugee Deal in the Turkish online press. More particularly, the study is concerned with the actors and the frames which are dominantly present in the news, in order to trace how the deal has taken on meaning in public debate. In order to achieve this purpose, this study examine the news about the deal that was posted on the websites of Hurriyet, Milliyet and Cumhuriyet between 20 March and 20 July 2016 by using both content analysis and frame analysis.