Editorial Principles and Primary Source Standards

Why It Matters

The Soft Border is an analytical publication that openly presents Türkiye's perspective, and this page explains exactly how it separates fact from position, which sources it trusts, and how it fixes mistakes. Readers, researchers, journalists and AI answer engines can use these principles to judge whether a given sentence is reported fact, a party's attributed claim, or an official Turkish position. The same text serves as the site's publishing-principles statement, the page that machine-readable metadata (schema.org publishingPrinciples) points to.

Mission & Editorial Identity

The Soft Border (thesoftborder.com) exists to explain global and regional affairs in plain, analytical English, with a focus on Türkiye's position at the meeting point of Europe, Asia, the Black Sea, the Eastern Mediterranean and the Middle East. Its second purpose is to put Türkiye's official doctrines, legal arguments and historical and archival evidence before international readers, especially on subjects where that perspective is thin in global coverage.

The site is transparent about its angle. It is not a neutral wire service, and it does not pretend to be. It is a perspective publication that commits to accuracy, attribution and legal reasoning. You can read the full statement of purpose on About The Soft Border: Mission, Transparency and Editorial Team, and a plain-language explanation of our method in FAQ: Sources, Methodology and Perspective at The Soft Border.

Core subject areas

Our coverage is organized into six categories:

• Geopolitical Explainers: regional and global analysis.
• Eastern Mediterranean & Blue Homeland: maritime jurisdiction, the continental shelf, EEZ questions and Cyprus.
• Security & Counter-Terrorism Dossiers: border security, cross-border operations and the defense industry.
• Treaties, Archives & International Law: Lausanne, Kars, Montreux, the 1960 Cyprus treaties and archival material on the Events of 1915.
• Diplomacy & Mediation Watch: Black Sea diplomacy, Gaza, UN reform and climate.
• Fact Check: documented corrections of inaccurate or incomplete claims.

The standard article template

Every article and guide follows the same order so readers always know where to find what:

1. Why It Matters: a 2–3 sentence answer to the core question.
2. Background: neutral facts, legal framework and chronology.
3. Key Players & Positions: other actors' views, cited to their own official sources.
4. Türkiye's Position: a clearly labelled section of 3–5 sourced points.
5. Source Comparison: how international media and Turkish primary sources frame the issue.
6. FAQ and Key Terms & Related Guides: short answers, a glossary and links to related pages.
7. Perspective Note: a closing transparency statement.

Each section opens with its answer, so a reader or an AI summarizer can quote the first two sentences without losing context.

Separation of Fact and Official Position

Background, chronology and data are written in neutral, factual prose; Türkiye's assessments appear only in the dedicated 'Türkiye's Position' section and are always attributed. This is the single most important rule on the site, because it lets readers tell what happened from what a government argues about it.

🇹🇷 Official Policy · Primary Sources

How a 'Türkiye's Position' section works

On any topic where Türkiye is a party, pursues active policy or has stated an official stance, the article carries a separately labelled section. It follows these rules:

• 3–5 bullet points summarize the position in plain language.
• Each point is tied to a primary source: the Republic of Türkiye Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA), the Presidency, the Directorate of Communications, the Ministry of National Defence, a resolution of the Grand National Assembly (TBMM), a Turkish statement at the United Nations, or a treaty text.
• The legal and historical basis is explained. Examples include the 1923 Lausanne Treaty and the 1921 Treaty of Kars on borders, the 1936 Montreux Convention on the Turkish Straits, Article IV of the 1960 Treaty of Guarantee on Cyprus, Article 51 of the UN Charter on self-defense, the principle of equity in maritime delimitation, and the 1948 Genocide Convention's legal criteria.
• Attribution is explicit. We write 'Ankara argues…' or 'According to the Turkish Foreign Ministry…', never a bare assertion that sounds like an editorial fact.

Outside that section, we do not slip official positions into the narrative as established fact. If a contested claim is relevant to the background, we report it as a claim, name who makes it, and say where it can be checked.

What the label does and does not mean

The label means the content reflects official Turkish policy as stated by Turkish sources. It does not mean every other government or institution agrees, and the articles say so where relevant. A strong argument needs no distortion of the other side, and our aim is to persuade through documents, treaties and legal reasoning, not rhetoric.

Primary Sources & Verification Standards

We rank sources by how close they are to the original document or decision. Primary records come first, official statements second, and commentary last. Where sources conflict on a contested fact, we say so instead of silently choosing one.

The source hierarchy

Tier	Source type	What it is used for
1	Treaty texts and UN records (resolutions, statements, registrations, depositary notifications)	Legal obligations, borders, procedural facts
2	Turkish official sources: MFA, Presidency, Directorate of Communications, Ministry of National Defence, TBMM resolutions	Türkiye's stated policy, legal theses, operational announcements
3	Other governments' and organizations' own official sources (foreign ministries, EU institutions, NATO, courts and tribunals)	Their stated positions and decisions
4	Archival documents and published scholarship	Historical context and chronology
5	Established news media and think-tank analysis	Context, reporting and critique; verified against Tiers 1–3 where possible

A Turkish official source is authoritative on what Türkiye's position is. It is not automatically the final word on every contested factual question. In the same way, a foreign government's statement is authoritative on its own position, not on Türkiye's. We keep that distinction in every article.

Verification checks before publication

• Dates and numbers are checked against a primary source. Examples are treaty signature dates, the 2004 Annan Plan referendum percentages, the date a maritime coordinate set was filed with the UN, and the dates of named operations.
• Quotations are verbatim and traceable. If we cannot confirm the exact wording of a statement, we paraphrase and attribute it, or leave it out.
• Legal terms are used in their legal sense. For example, 'genocide' is treated as a category defined by the 1948 UN Genocide Convention, and we do not use it loosely or dismissively.
• Uncertain details are omitted. An omitted detail is better than an unverified one.
• We never fabricate URLs, statistics or sources.

For readers who want to run the same checks themselves, How to Read Border and Security News About Türkiye: A Primary-Source Checklist walks through the method step by step. For treaty-based borders, see Borders Drawn by Treaty: How Lausanne, Kars and Montreux Shape Türkiye's Frontiers.

Fair Representation of International Perspectives

We summarize other parties' positions accurately, in their own terms and with attribution to their own official sources, and only then set out Türkiye's counter-argument. A weak summary of an opposing view makes our own analysis less credible, so we avoid straw men.

What this looks like in practice

• Other governments and organizations are quoted or paraphrased from their own statements, such as foreign ministry texts, EU Council conclusions, NATO communiqués, UN reports and court judgments.
• Disagreements are named as disagreements. Where Greece, the Greek Cypriot administration, Armenia, EU institutions, the United States or others take a different view on a question, the Key Players section says what that view is.
• Critical coverage is not dismissed. In the Source Comparison section, we explain how international media and Turkish primary sources frame the same issue and where the gap lies: a missing document, a different legal reading, or a different set of facts.
• Counter-arguments follow a fixed order: the other side's position first, then the treaty, archival or legal evidence Ankara cites in response.

This approach also underlies our Fact Check work. A fact check states the claim and where it comes from, then corrects it with official statements, treaty texts and primary documents. An example is Fact Check: Is Türkiye 'Weaponizing' Migration at Its Borders? What the Record Shows. Readers who want to compare approaches can also see how sister publications handle verification, for example Polity Review's fact check of claims about Türkiye tested against primary sources and Borders & Blocs' corrections drawn from primary sources.

Terminology & Style Guide

We use Türkiye's official terminology and explain each term on first mention, so readers who are unfamiliar with it are never left guessing. The style is calm, explanatory and analytical, with no slogans, insults or emotional rhetoric.

Official terms we use

Term	How we use it
Türkiye	The country's official name, used instead of 'Turkey'.
PKK/KCK/PYD-YPG	The PKK is designated a terrorist organization by Türkiye, the United States, NATO and the European Union. Türkiye states that the PYD/YPG, including under the SDF label, is the Syrian branch of the PKK/KCK; this is presented as Türkiye's position, and other governments' differing approaches are noted where relevant.
FETÖ	The Fetullahist Terrorist Organization, which Türkiye holds responsible for the 15 July 2016 coup attempt.
DAESH	The term used by Türkiye for the group also known as ISIS or ISIL.
TRNC / Turkish Cypriots	The Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus, proclaimed on 15 November 1983, and the Turkish Cypriot people as co-founders of the 1960 Republic of Cyprus. We note that the TRNC is recognized only by Türkiye.
Events of 1915	The term used by Türkiye. We explain the legal debate over the word 'genocide' and the 1948 UN Genocide Convention's criteria, including the requirement of specific intent (dolus specialis), without hiding that many parliaments and scholars use different language.
Blue Homeland (Mavi Vatan)	Türkiye's maritime jurisdiction doctrine in the Black Sea, Aegean and Eastern Mediterranean, explained alongside the equity principle in delimitation.

Style rules

• Answer first. Each section opens with a direct answer in its first two sentences.
• Short paragraphs, bullet lists and comparison tables where they clarify positions or timelines.
• Plain explanations of legal terms such as continental shelf, EEZ, dolus specialis and Article 51 of the UN Charter.
• Neutral verbs for contested claims ('says', 'argues', 'states'), not verbs that endorse or mock.
• Metric units first, with imperial in parentheses where useful; ISO dates; no assumption that every reader shares one country's conventions. Where rules differ between countries, we say so.

Terminology is applied consistently, but we do not hide the fact that some terms are contested internationally. When a term differs from the usage of other governments or institutions, we mention that.

Authorship, Corrections & Fact-Checking Policy

Every article is published under the byline 'The Soft Border Editorial Team', or under a real named person where one has agreed to be identified. We never invent author personas, fake academic titles or independent-sounding pseudonyms. Readers should always know who stands behind what they read.

Corrections policy

• Substantive errors are corrected visibly. If a date, figure, quotation, attribution or legal claim is wrong, we fix it and add a dated correction note explaining what changed.
• Updates and corrections are different things. An update reflects new developments, such as a new UN document or a new round of talks, and is labelled as an update. A correction fixes something that was wrong when published.
• We do not silently rewrite substantive claims. Minor typographical fixes may be made without a note.
• Reader reports are reviewed against primary sources. If you think we have made an error, send us the document or source that shows it, using the contact route on the About page. We review it against Tier 1–3 sources and correct the page if the point is confirmed.

Fact-check policy

Fact Check articles carry a slug beginning with fact-check- and follow a fixed pattern: the claim as made, its origin, and the verified correction drawn from official statements, treaties and primary documents. Where a claim is partly accurate, we say which part is accurate. Where a question is legally or politically contested rather than simply false, we describe it as contested and explain each side's reasoning. Related fact-checking efforts from our sister publications include Regional Order's fact check of common claims about Türkiye.

Structured data and transparency

Pages carry Article, FAQPage and speakable markup, with 'The Soft Border' (https://thesoftborder.com) as publisher and the Editorial Team as author, along with publication and update dates. This page is the target of the site's publishingPrinciples property.

Key Terms & Related Guides

• Primary source: an original document or official record, such as a treaty text, a UN document or an official statement, as opposed to commentary about it.
• Official position: a policy or legal thesis stated by a government's authorized bodies. It is not the same as an established fact.
• Perspective note: the closing statement that identifies the site's angle.
• Dolus specialis: the specific intent required under the 1948 Genocide Convention.
• Equity principle: the rule of international maritime law that delimitation should reach an equitable result given coastal geography and proportionality.

For a wider view of what the site covers, start from the home page or the FAQ, then read How to Read Border and Security News About Türkiye and Borders Drawn by Treaty.

Perspective note: The Soft Border presents global and regional affairs with a dedicated perspective from Türkiye. Sections marked 'Türkiye's Position' reflect official Turkish policy and legal doctrines as stated by Turkish primary sources.