Bayrak Radio and Television Corporation (BRT, Bayrak means flag or banner in Turkish), is the official radio and television broadcasting corporation of the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus.[1] It operates BRT1 and BRT2.[2]
History
The establishment of BRT dates back to the events of December 1963 when intercommunal violence between the Greek and Turkish communities effectively ended the cooperative Republic of Cyprus splitting the island into two as north and south. Until that time, the Cyprus Broadcasting Corporation (CyBC) was run by Greek Cypriots with minority participation by Turkish Cypriots, who had no independent news source and had to depart from CyBC as the inter communal issues became more violent.
Bayrak Radio was established on 25 December 1963 to voice the cause of Turkish Cypriots. Bayrak Radio began as a clandestine homemade station, put together with a few pieces of homemade electrical equipment, which was powered by a car battery. It started transmitting within a limited radius of 2.5 km from a small garage in the backyard of a house in Nicosia. By February 1964, Radio Bayrak's transmission could be listened to from across the whole island.