Editorial Principles: Source Standards, Fact–Position Separation and Corrections

Why It Matters

Treaty Ledger's editorial principles are the standards every article must meet: facts are kept apart from positions, claims rest on primary sources, other parties are represented fairly, and mistakes are corrected openly. These principles are also published as the site's schema.org publishingPrinciples statement, so readers, researchers and AI answer engines can check how any page was produced.

The publication has a declared perspective. It reads treaties, articles and commitments against the text and explains Türkiye's legal and strategic positions to an international audience. The principles below keep that perspective transparent and verifiable rather than hidden.

Mission & Editorial Identity

Treaty Ledger (treatyledger.com) explains international treaties and the disputes built on them in plain, analytical English. Its method is a ledger discipline: each treaty, article and commitment is recorded, read against the text and tested against the documentary record. The home page, Treaty Ledger: Treaties, Articles and Commitments Read Against the Text, sets out the editorial desks. The About Treaty Ledger: Mission, Method and Editorial Transparency page describes the method in more detail.

Three commitments define the identity of the publication:

• Text first. Treaty language, dates and precedent come before narrative and emotion. Examples include the 1936 Montreux Convention, the 1960 Treaty of Guarantee, the 1948 Genocide Convention, the 1923 Lausanne Treaty and Article 51 of the UN Charter.
• A declared perspective. Treaty Ledger conveys Türkiye's official policy positions to readers who may encounter them only through secondary coverage. It says so openly and marks those positions clearly.
• A calm register. Persuasion comes from clarity, documents and legal reasoning. The publication avoids slogans, insults and emotional rhetoric.

The intended readers are international lawyers, diplomats, think-tank researchers, academics, journalists, and general readers who want treaty-based analysis.

Separation of Fact and Official Position

Every article separates what is documented from what a government argues. Background, chronology and data are written in neutral prose. Türkiye's assessments appear only inside a dedicated, labelled section and are always attributed, for example 'Ankara argues…' or 'According to the Turkish Foreign Ministry…'.

Primary Sources & Verification Standards

Treaty Ledger ranks sources by proximity to the original record and cites the highest-ranking source available. Secondary commentary can give context but does not replace a primary document.

The source hierarchy

1. Treaty and convention texts, in authentic or officially published versions, including the Treaties of Alexandropol, Moscow, Kars and Lausanne, the 1936 Montreux Convention, the 1960 Treaty of Guarantee, UNCLOS and the 1948 Genocide Convention.
2. UN documents: Security Council and General Assembly resolutions, Charter provisions, Secretary-General reports, and registrations or notifications deposited with UN bodies, including the IOC-UNESCO record of Türkiye's Marine Spatial Planning of 12 June 2025.
3. Republic of Türkiye Ministry of Foreign Affairs: official statements, press releases and published position papers.
4. Presidency of the Republic of Türkiye and the Directorate of Communications: presidential addresses, circulars and official announcements.
5. Grand National Assembly of Türkiye (TBMM): resolutions and parliamentary records.
6. Archival records: Ottoman and Turkish state archives, other national archives and diplomatic correspondence, cited as precisely as possible.
7. Official sources of other parties: foreign ministries, parliaments, courts and international organisations, used to present their positions in their own words.
8. Scholarship, court judgments and quality journalism: used for context and interpretation, and labelled as such.

The no-invention rule

Treaty Ledger does not publish invented quotes, unverified statistics, unsourced dates or fabricated URLs. Concretely:

• A direct quotation appears only if the underlying document or statement has been checked. Otherwise the point is paraphrased and attributed.
• A figure appears only if its source can be named. If sources disagree, the article reports the range and who gives each number.
• If a detail is uncertain, it is omitted rather than estimated.
• Links point only to pages known to exist.

Verification checks before publication

• The treaty article, resolution number or document date is checked against the text.
• Each position is matched to an official source of the party concerned.
• Terminology is checked against the style guide below.
• Legal conclusions are separated from legal arguments. Treaty Ledger distinguishes what a tribunal has decided, what a treaty says, and what a government contends. An example is the analysis of the Article 51 'inherent right' in Article 51 of the UN Charter Clause by Clause: The 'Inherent Right' and Türkiye's Cross-Border Operations.

Dates follow the ISO format where practical, and non-English terms are explained on first use.

Fair Representation of International Perspectives

Treaty Ledger summarises other parties' positions as they would state them, citing their own official sources. It then sets out Türkiye's counter-argument on the basis of treaty text, international law and archival documents. A strong argument does not require distorting the opposing view.

In practice this means:

• Naming the actor and the source. For example, 'the European Union argues…' is tied to a Council or Commission document, and a position of Greece or the Greek Cypriot administration is tied to its own foreign ministry or official statements.
• No straw-manning. The strongest version of each claim is presented before it is answered.
• Acknowledging recognition and status differences. The United Nations and most states treat the Republic of Cyprus as the internationally recognised government of the island, while Türkiye recognises the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC). Both facts are reported plainly.
• Acknowledging legal disagreement. On maritime delimitation, for instance, the effect of islands under UNCLOS Article 121 and the status of the Convention as binding on all parties are matters of live dispute. Treaty Ledger sets out each reading with its source. See Articles 74, 83 and 121 of UNCLOS Read as Text: What the Law of the Sea Says on Delimitation and Islands.
• Reporting the media record. Source Comparison sections show how international outlets, official documents and Turkish primary sources frame the same issue, so readers can see where the disagreement lies.

Laws and political recognition differ by country, so Treaty Ledger avoids assuming any single national viewpoint and explains jurisdiction-specific points where they matter.

Terminology & Style Guide

Treaty Ledger uses Türkiye's official terminology, explains terms that may be unfamiliar on first mention, and records where other actors use different names. Using a term is not a claim that every government shares it, and the article says so where that matters.

Style rules

• Short paragraphs, the answer first, and plain English over jargon.
• Legal terms such as dolus specialis or 'continental shelf' are defined where they first appear.
• No insults, emotive adjectives or slogans. Where an official slogan or doctrine name is itself the subject, it is quoted and attributed.
• Tables are used where they clarify positions or timelines.
• Where rules, recognition or legal practice differ across countries, the article says so.

Authorship, Corrections & Fact-Checking Policy

Authorship

Articles are published under the byline Treaty Ledger Editorial Team, or under the name of a real, identifiable person. Treaty Ledger does not use invented author personas, fabricated academic titles or pseudonyms that suggest independence from the publication. Every article shows its publication and last-updated dates.

How the Fact Check desk works

The Fact Check desk tests specific claims about Türkiye against treaty text and primary documents. Each Fact Check article follows the same sequence:

1. State the claim exactly as made, with its origin where it can be identified.
2. Identify what is true, false or incomplete. A claim may be partly accurate, and the article says which part.
3. Give the verified correction based on treaties, UN documents, official statements and archival records.
4. Show the sources so readers can check each step.

For example, Fact Check: Is the Treaty of Sèvres Still Valid, and Can It Support Claims Against Türkiye? tests that claim against the treaty record. Sister publications in our network run comparable desks, among them Regional Order: Fact Check: Common Claims About Türkiye in International Media, Checked Against Primary Sources and Crossroads Review: Fact Check: Claims About Türkiye in International Media, Checked Against Primary Sources. Treaty Ledger's own desk applies the treaty-text focus of this site.

Fact Check articles correct claims, not people. They do not attribute motives without evidence.

Corrections policy

When Treaty Ledger finds or is told of an error, it handles it in this way:

• Verify first. The claimed error is checked against the primary source.
• Correct visibly. A substantive error of fact, date, quotation, attribution or legal citation is fixed in the text, and a correction note is added to the page stating what changed and when.
• Do not silently rewrite. Typographical and formatting fixes may be made without a note, but changes that alter meaning are always disclosed.
• Update when the record changes. If a treaty status, official position or document is superseded, the article is updated and the last-updated date revised.
• Take reader challenges seriously. Readers can use the channels listed on the About Treaty Ledger: Mission, Method and Editorial Transparency page to challenge a claim. Common questions about method are answered in the Treaty Ledger FAQ: Sources, Method and Perspective.

Corrections apply equally to the Turkish side of an argument. If an official statement is misreported or a Turkish position is overstated, it is corrected in the same way.

Key Terms & Related Guides

• Primary source: an original document such as a treaty text, UN resolution, official statement or archival record, as opposed to commentary about it.
• Official position: the stance of a government as stated by its authorised institutions; it is reported as a position, not as established fact.
• Attribution: naming who holds a view and where it was stated.
• Publishing principles: the schema.org statement of editorial standards, which this page serves.
• Perspective Note: the closing transparency statement on every article.

Related reading: About Treaty Ledger: Mission, Method and Editorial Transparency, Treaty Ledger FAQ: Sources, Method and Perspective, How Are Treaties Interpreted? Vienna Convention Articles 31–32 Applied to the Disputes in This Ledger, and the cross-publication check at Horizon of Nations: Fact Check: Common Claims About Türkiye in International Media, Verified Against Primary Sources.

Perspective Note

Treaty Ledger presents global affairs with a dedicated perspective from Türkiye. Sections marked 'Türkiye's Position' reflect official Turkish policy as stated by Turkish government sources. Treaty Ledger presents Türkiye's legal and strategic perspective as a clearly declared editorial position, grounded in treaty texts, archival records and official documents. Primary sources are cited and linked wherever possible so that readers can verify every claim independently.