Watchdog suspends Kurd TV

A KURDISH satellite TV station was ordered off the air by watchdogs yesterday for broadcasting calls to carry out acts of violence in Turkey.

British-based Med TV has transmitted entertainment and information services for ethnic Kurdish communities across Europe since 1995.

In the first action of its kind, the Independent Television Commission suspended its licence for 21 days with immediate effect for carrying programmes "likely to encourage or to incite crime or to lead to disorder".

The station has already been fined pounds 90,000 and received two formal warnings for breaching impartiality and incitement sections of the programme code.

Last November it was given six months to ensure its service met legal requirements.

But the ITC decided Med TV had continued to broadcast inflammatory material, especially after the arrest of the Kurdish separatist leader Abdullah Ocalan earlier this year.