Evaluation of news about Syrian asylum seeker children in the context of rights-based journalism

Due to the conflicts that started in March 2011, many Syrians had to leave their country and take refuge in different countries. Turkey, which has more than three and a half million war-torn Syrians, is one of those countries, and more than half of Syrian asylum seekers in Turkey are children. Children are undoubtedly among the most affected by the conflicts in Syria and the forced migration movement, exposed to their most basic rights such as the right to life, the right to health, the right to protection, the right to education. One of the responsibilities of the media is to raise the voices of disadvantaged groups in society, such as women, children, disabled people, whose rights have been violated, to raise the issue of rights violations against them, to inform the public about rights and to raise awareness. On the other hand, the media can sometimes cause violations of rights while reporting rights violations. Rights-based journalism, which is one of the alternative reporting types, does not consider the role of the media to be limited to only informing people about rights, but adopts a journalism that focuses on human and human rights and nd aims not to cause rights violations when reporting In this study, the presentation of the news in media related to Syrian refugee children is evaluated within the context of Human Rights-Based Journalism. In June January 1, 2019 – June 30, 2020, the five highest circulation newspapers in Turkey were taken as a sample and the news about Syrian asylum seeker children were examined by content analysis method.