After Turkey banned access to Instagram on Friday, several Turkish users of the social media network complained on the well-known social media platform X that they were unable to update their feeds.
Although the national communications authority did not explain, a senior Turkish official charged that the American company was engaging in censorship.
Without providing any other information, the BTK communications regulator stated on its website that "instagram.com has been blocked by a decision on the date of 02/08/2024."
Fahrettin Altun, the director of communications for the Turkish presidency, accused Instagram, a company owned by Meta, of "impeding people from publishing messages of condolence for the martyr Haniyeh" on the social media site on Wednesday.
Ismail Haniyeh, the political leader of Hamas, and a close supporter of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, was assassinated in Tehran on Wednesday in an incident that was attributed to Israel.
Altun stated on X, "This is a very clear and obvious attempt at censure."
Out of the 85 million people living in Turkey, more than 50 million of them have Instagram accounts, according to Turkish media.
The choice provoked mockery on other social media platforms, like X.
The hashtag "X when Turks wake up to find that Instagram is blocked" appeared in a meme depicting a crowded metro station that went viral on the platform.
An Instagram user posted a picture of a crying guy with the caption, "Life is over, and Instagram is blocked in Turkey."
Access to social media websites has previously been restricted by Turkish authorities.
Due to two entries that purported to establish a connection between the president and extremists, Wikipedia was prohibited between April 2017 and January 2020.
That was shocking in the country where Erdogan's government is frequently charged with violating civil liberties because of the volume of web content that was rendered unavailable.
After Turkish authorities decided to stop it from sharing data with Instagram, Facebook's parent company Meta decided to halt its Threads social network in that country in April.
