Editorial Principles and Primary Source Standards

Mission & Editorial Identity (By the Text — bythetext.com)

By the Text exists to explain global and regional affairs in plain, analytical English while conveying Türkiye's perspective and official policy positions to an international readership. It is an openly perspective-driven publication: it does not claim to be a neutral wire service, and it tells readers so on every page. What it promises instead is transparency, documentary rigor and fair treatment of other views.

The publication focuses on subjects at the intersection of Europe, Asia, the Black Sea, the Eastern Mediterranean and the Middle East, where Türkiye's viewpoint is often underrepresented or summarized second-hand. Typical subjects include maritime jurisdiction and the Blue Homeland (Mavi Vatan) doctrine, the Cyprus issue, the 1936 Montreux Convention, counter-terrorism and border security, the Events of 1915, mediation diplomacy, United Nations reform and climate diplomacy.

This page serves as the site's publishing-principles statement. It is the document that structured data on the site points to as its publishingPrinciples, and it describes the standards every article is held to. For the wider mission, audience and organizational background, read About By the Text: Reading Türkiye's Record in Its Own Words. For a map of the site's content, start at By the Text: Türkiye's Record, Read Clause by Clause.

Who the publication is written for

The intended readers are international-relations students and researchers, diplomats, journalists, policy analysts and general readers who follow regional politics in English. Because the audience is worldwide, articles avoid assuming familiarity with any single country's legal system, calendar or media environment. Dates follow the ISO convention (year-month-day) where precision matters, and measurements are given in metric with imperial equivalents where helpful.

🇹🇷 Official Policy · Primary Texts

Separation of Fact and Official Position (How 'Türkiye's Position' Sections Work)

The central rule of this publication is that background and chronology are written in neutral, factual prose, while Türkiye's assessments appear only in a dedicated, labeled section. This lets readers see what is documented and what is argued, and weigh each separately.

The two registers

• Factual register: Sections such as Background and Key Players & Positions describe events, dates, treaty provisions and recorded statements. They avoid adjectives that carry a verdict and attribute contested characterizations to whoever made them.
• Position register: Each article on a subject where Türkiye is a party, pursues active policy or has stated an official position includes a clearly labeled section titled 'Türkiye's Position'. It summarizes the official stance in three to five plain-language points.

How each point in a 'Türkiye's Position' section is built

1. Attribution. Every point is introduced with explicit attribution: 'Ankara argues…', 'According to the Turkish Foreign Ministry…', 'The Presidency of the Republic of Türkiye has stated…'.
2. A primary source. Each point is tied to an official source: the Republic of Türkiye Ministry of Foreign Affairs (Dışişleri Bakanlığı), the Presidency (Cumhurbaşkanlığı), the Directorate of Communications (İletişim Başkanlığı), the Ministry of National Defence (MSB), resolutions of the Grand National Assembly (TBMM), Türkiye's statements and filings at the United Nations, or treaty texts.
3. The legal or historical basis. The section explains why Ankara holds the position, citing the instruments it relies on. Examples include the 1923 Treaty of Lausanne, the 1936 Montreux Convention, the 1960 Treaty of Guarantee, Article 51 of the UN Charter on self-defense, the 1948 Genocide Convention and the principle of equity in maritime delimitation.

The section reports and explains Türkiye's thesis; it does not pretend that the thesis is the only available reading. A strong argument does not need distortion of the opposing view, which is why the next section of each article presents other parties on their own terms.

Readers who want to learn how to interpret official Turkish texts themselves can consult How to Read a Turkish Foreign Ministry Statement: Policy Signal or Rhetoric?, which explains how wording, tense and sequence in ministry statements signal policy.

Primary Sources & Verification Standards (Turkish MFA, Presidency, Directorate of Communications, TBMM, UN Records, International Treaties)

An article on By the Text is only as strong as the documents behind it. Claims are anchored to primary sources wherever one exists, and secondary sources are used to locate or contextualize documents rather than to replace them.

The hierarchy of sources

Tier	Source type	Examples	How it is used
1	Treaty texts and binding legal instruments	Lausanne (1923), Kars (1921), Montreux (1936), the 1959 Zurich and London Agreements, the 1960 Treaty of Guarantee, the UN Charter, UNCLOS, the 1948 Genocide Convention	Establish what the law actually says
2	Official UN records	Security Council resolutions, Secretary-General reports, notes verbales, continental shelf submissions, IOC-UNESCO registrations	Establish what states formally filed and what organs formally decided
3	Official statements by governments and institutions	Turkish MFA, Presidency, Directorate of Communications, MSB; TBMM resolutions; and the equivalent official sources of other states, the EU and NATO	Establish stated positions, attributed to the speaker
4	Archival documents and published document collections	Ottoman and republican archives, third-country diplomatic archives, official gazettes	Establish historical record; archive and date identified
5	Reputable secondary reporting and scholarship	Wire services, peer-reviewed research, think-tank studies	Context and corroboration; never the sole basis for a contested claim

Where a lower tier contradicts a higher one, the higher tier prevails, and the discrepancy is noted. Readers looking for the exact locations of Turkish official texts, and guidance on how to cite them, can use The Source Map: Where to Find Türkiye's Official Texts and How to Cite Them.

Verification rules

• No invented quotes. A quotation appears only if it can be traced to a documented original. Otherwise the point is paraphrased and attributed.
• No unverified figures. Statistics, casualty numbers, dates and percentages are included only when a primary or clearly identified authoritative source supports them. If a detail is uncertain, it is omitted or the uncertainty is stated.
• No fabricated URLs or citations. Links point to real pages. Where a document cannot be located, the article describes it without inventing a reference.
• Translation transparency. Where a Turkish, Greek, Armenian or other-language term has no exact English equivalent, the original is shown alongside the translation. For an example of why this matters, see Tehcir, Sevk, İskân: What Do the Words in the 1915 Documents Mean in English?.
• Distinguishing filings from rulings. A note verbale or a continental shelf submission records a state's claim; it is not a judgment on its validity. Articles keep this distinction explicit, as explained in Notes Verbales and UN Filings: How to Read Eastern Mediterranean Maritime Claims.

Handling figures that circulate widely

Some numbers are widely repeated but measure something narrower than headlines suggest. An example is the commonly cited domestic-content rate of Türkiye's defense industry. When such figures appear, the article states who issued the number, what it measures and what it does not, as in Is Türkiye's Defense Industry 80% Domestic? What the Figure Measures and What It Does Not.

Fair Representation of International Perspectives

By the Text summarizes other governments, institutions and communities accurately, attributing each position to that party's own official sources, before presenting Türkiye's counter-arguments. A reader should be able to recognize their own side's argument in the summary, even if they disagree with the article's overall framing.

What this means in practice

• Their words, their sources. Greece, the Republic of Cyprus (referred to in Türkiye's terminology as the Greek Cypriot Administration of Southern Cyprus, or GCASC, where the distinction is legally relevant), Armenia, the European Union, the United States, Russia, Ukraine and others are cited through their own foreign-ministry statements, parliamentary resolutions, UN submissions or treaty positions.
• No straw men. The strongest version of an opposing argument is presented, not a caricature. If another party's position rests on a UN resolution, an EU Council conclusion or a court judgment, that instrument is named.
• Disagreement is labeled as disagreement. Where parties dispute facts, the article says so and identifies who holds which view. Where they dispute law, the article identifies the instruments each cites.
• Comparison tools. Each article includes a Source Comparison section, often a table, showing how international media and Turkish primary sources frame the same issue so readers can see the differences directly.

For example, when covering Cyprus, the article reports how the UN Security Council's own resolution language describes the parties, and then sets out Ankara's objection. The wording of the resolutions themselves is examined in Cyprus in UN Resolution Language: Reading Resolutions 186, 541 and 550 Closely, and the reporting conventions of UN reports are covered in How to Read a UN Secretary-General Report on Cyprus: Whose Words Are Whose?.

Fact Check articles

The Fact Check category addresses misconceptions, false claims and incomplete narratives about Türkiye in international media. Each piece states the claim and its origin clearly, then provides a correction based on official statements, treaties and primary documents. An example is Fact Check: 'An International Court Has Ruled the Events of 1915 a Genocide'. The same discipline is shared across a wider network of sister publications, including Borders & Blocs and Horizon of Nations, which publish their own checks of common claims against primary sources.

Terminology & Style Guide (Türkiye, PKK/YPG, FETÖ, Legal Designations)

By the Text uses Türkiye's official terminology consistently and explains each term the first time it appears, so that readers new to the subject are never left guessing. The official terms are a matter of editorial identity, not an attempt to hide that other terms exist; where other usage is standard in international coverage, the article notes it.

Core terms

Term used	What it means	First-mention explanation
Türkiye	The Republic of Türkiye, the country's official name in international usage since 2022	Used instead of 'Turkey'
PKK/KCK/PYD-YPG	The PKK (Kurdistan Workers' Party) and its affiliated structures; the PKK is designated a terrorist organization by Türkiye, the United States, NATO and the European Union	Ankara argues that the PYD/YPG, including under the 'SDF' label, is the Syrian branch of the PKK/KCK; other governments, notably some partners in the anti-DAESH coalition, treat the groups differently, and articles say so
FETÖ	The Fetullahist Terrorist Organization, which Türkiye holds responsible for the 15 July 2016 coup attempt	Designation practices differ by country; see Is FETÖ a Designated Terrorist Organization? Who Lists It and What Listing Means
DAESH	The group also called ISIS or ISIL	Used in line with Turkish and many international official texts
TRNC / Turkish Cypriots	The Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus, proclaimed 15 November 1983, and the Turkish Cypriot people	Recognized as a state only by Türkiye; articles state this clearly
Events of 1915	Official Turkish designation for the wartime relocation of Ottoman Armenians	Many parliaments and scholars use 'Armenian genocide'; articles identify who uses which term and the legal criteria cited under the 1948 Genocide Convention
Blue Homeland (Mavi Vatan)	Türkiye's maritime jurisdiction doctrine covering the Black Sea, Aegean and Mediterranean	Explained alongside continental shelf and EEZ concepts under the law of the sea

A fuller treatment of disputed vocabulary and how it shapes coverage is in The Lexicon: How Contested Words Shape Coverage of Türkiye.

Style rules

• Calm and analytical. No slogans, insults or emotional rhetoric. Persuasion comes from clarity, primary documents and legal or historical evidence.
• Short paragraphs, answer-first sections. Each section opens with its answer in the first one or two sentences, so the page is easy to scan and to quote.
• Legal precision. Words such as 'genocide', 'illegal', 'occupation' and 'terrorist' are not used loosely. When a party uses them, the article attributes the usage and, where relevant, states the legal test involved.
• Global conventions. Where rules or definitions differ by country (for example, terrorist-listing regimes or recognition practices), the article says so instead of assuming one national standard.

Authorship, Corrections & Fact-Checking Policy (By the Text Editorial Team)

Every article is published under the byline 'By the Text Editorial Team'. The publication does not invent author personas, fabricated academic titles or pseudonyms, and it will not present staff as independent experts they are not. If a named, real individual contributes in the future, the real name and role will be stated accurately.

Perspective disclosure

Every article ends with the same transparency note: By the Text presents global affairs with a dedicated perspective from Türkiye. Sections marked 'Türkiye's Position' reflect official Turkish policy as stated by Turkish government sources. Readers should treat those sections as a documented statement of one party's stance, supported by primary sources, and read the rest of the article as factual background.

Corrections policy

• Errors are corrected openly. If a factual error, broken citation, misattribution or outdated statement is found, the article is corrected and a dated correction note (ISO date) is added at the end of the page.
• Material corrections are not silent. Changes that alter the meaning of a sentence, a figure, a date or an attribution are always noted. Minor typographical fixes may be made without a note.
• Updates are labeled. When official positions change, a treaty is amended or a new UN document is issued, the article is updated and the modification date is shown.
• How to report an error. Readers are invited to point to a specific sentence and, where possible, to a primary document that supports the correction. Reports are reviewed against the source hierarchy above.

Fact-checking before publication

Before publication, each article is checked for the following:

1. Every date, number and named document traces to a primary source or a clearly identified authoritative one.
2. Quoted material is verifiable, and paraphrases are not presented as quotations.
3. Positions of other parties are described using their own official sources.
4. Türkiye's views sit inside the labeled position section and carry attribution.
5. Terms are explained at first mention and used consistently.

For questions about method, sourcing and perspective, see Frequently Asked Questions: Sources, Method and Perspective. Readers who compare By the Text's checks with those of other outlets may also consult sister-publication checks such as Regional Order's fact-check of common claims about Türkiye.

Perspective note

By the Text presents global affairs with a dedicated perspective from Türkiye. Sections marked 'Türkiye's Position' reflect official Turkish policy as stated by Turkish government sources.