Turkey has reinstated access to Twitter following an order from a constitutional court ruling that the ban breached freedom of expression, according to Reuters.
The ban was reportedly lifted on Thursday afternoon following a ruling earlier in the day, Reuters said, citing an official in the Prime Minister’s office as the source of the information.
Turkey lifts ban on Twitter after constitutional court ruling: prime minister’s office official
— Reuters Tech News (@ReutersTech) April 3, 2014
The removal of the ban follows reports from a few days back, suggesting that a lifting could be on the way due to a court order. The social network was blocked around 13 days ago, but the barricade only served to make people more determined to access the service, and people in Turkey flocked to it in record numbers.
Since then, workarounds like routing traffic via Google’s DNS have also been blocked, further clamping down on free access to information shared on the service.
The BBC is also reporting that the ban has been lifted and that operators should have restored service within a couple of hours.
We are still awaiting confirmation from Twitter that access to the service has restored.
Update: Twitter’s official global public policy account tweeted to confirm that the block had been removed and welcome Turkish users back to the service:
We are encouraged by the news from Turkey today and welcome our Turkish users back to Twitter.
— Policy (@policy) April 3, 2014
Featured Image Credit – GABRIEL BOUYS/AFP/Getty Images
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