Turkey gets a "weak" rating in the Public Integrity Index, which tracks corruption, openness and accountability in 25 countries. This peer-reviewed country report includes a timeline covering corruption over the past one to two decades, a reporter's notebook on the culture of corruption and an assessment of the six main integrity categories. The integrity scorecard lists the full set of integrity indicators with scores, commentary and references.
When I started investigating my first big corruption case, what surprised me most was how easy it was to unravel it.
At first I thought this was due to my competence as journalist. But soon I understood that I was progressing with ease because the perpetrators of the theft were so confident they were beyond the reach of the law that they had not bothered to cover their tracks. They knew that they would not be caught and the money they stole would not be taken from them. Subsequent events proved they were right. >>
According to the Constitution and the relevant laws, citizens may freely form civil society organizations without prior permission. They merely need to collect the relevant documents, have them notarized and submit them to the authorities. But two points must be considered: restrictions on the activities of these associations, and the enormity of the red tape at every step. >>