• by Erik Sass , Staff Writer @eriksass1, August 31, 2015

With its reputation for edgy coverage of dicey situations, it’s no surprise Vice News occasionally finds itself on the wrong side of the Powers That Be. In the latest case, Vice reporters have apparently run afoul of the Turkish government, which has been employing increasingly repressive measures against news organizations reporting on the confused, violent situation in the country’s east.

Last week, Turkish anti-terrorism police detained four Vice News journalists in Diyarbakir, a city in the southeast of the country with a large Kurdish population. It is a focal point in the long conflict between the Turkish government and Kurdish nationalists seeking autonomy or even independence from Turkey.

After several years of promising negotiations, violence erupted again following the Turkish government’s refusal to help Kurdish forces besieged by ISIS in the city of Kobane, just across the Syrian border.

The four Vice reporters were apparently detained after filming violent clashes between Turkish police and demonstrators who support the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, better known as the PKK, the biggest Kurdish militant group.

The Turkish government is said to be preparing to charge the journalists with terrorism, although it is unclear on what grounds, as none were armed or participating in the violent encounters with police.

On that note, Turkish authorities have used trumped-up charges of terrorism and sedition to silence critics both foreign and domestic on a number of occasions, including during the protests that rocked Istanbul, the country’s main city, in the summer of 2013.

More recently a Dutch journalist, Frederike Geerdink, was arrested in Diyarbakir on charges of spreading terrorist propaganda, but she was acquitted after the prosecutor reversed course and called for the charges to be dropped.

As the handling of Geerdink’s case suggests, fabricated terrorism charges may simply be a convenient way for Turkish authorities to get journalists off the streets in order to limit damaging coverage, with no intention of actually following through with prosecutions.

That said, Vice is taking the arrests very seriously, with Vice founder Shane Smith calling for Turkey to “free our boys.” The journalists were due to appear in court in Turkey on Monday.