ANKARA
Turkey will not compete in the 2013 edition of the Eurovision Song Contest, the country's state-run broadcaster said Friday.
TRT, the Turkish broadcaster, cited reduced influence of televoting in the combined 50%/50% telephone/jury voting system for its decision as well as "unfairness" which it said caused by straight-to-the-final competitors Germany, France, England, Spain and Italy, "privileged" partners of the European Broadcasting Union, or EBU.
TRT said Turkey received better results between 2003 and 2010 when televoting had a higher share in the overall voting.
Turkey won the Eurovision 2003 for the first time in history of the contest with Sertab Erener's "Everyway That I Can", and it placed the second in 2010.
