Court orders YouTube and four other sites blocked over “extremist” content

By Tsering

Flickr Creative Commons | Howard Lifshitz

Reporters Sans Frontieres | July 30, 2010

Reporters Without Borders condemns the draconian and disproportionate ruling issued by judge Anna Eisenberg in the Russian far-east city of Komsomolsk-on-Amur on 16 July ordering local Internet Service Provider RA-RTS Rosnet to block access to video-sharing website YouTube and four other websites from 3 August onwards.

YouTube is to be blocked because of a nationalist video called “Russia for the Russians,” which is on a list of extremist content banned by the justice ministry. The other four sites – three online libraries (Lib.rus.ec, Thelib.ru and Zhurnal.ru) and Web.archives.org, which keeps copies of old or suppressed web pages – are to be blocked for having copies of Adolf Hitler’s “Mein Kampf.”

“This unilateral decision, blocking entire websites instead of targeting the offending web pages, violates freedom of information and could affect all of Russia’s Internet users,” Reporters Without Borders said. “Russia’s laws on extremism are much criticised because they are used arbitrarily and because they can have such dire consequences as the blocking of independent websites.”

The press freedom organisation added: “There are other mechanisms, envisaged in YouTube’s user conditions, for obtaining the withdrawal of videos that pose a problem. Why did the prosecutor take this case directly to court? Why didn’t he just contact YouTube’s moderators or those in charge of the online libraries to request withdrawal of the offending content?”

The head of the Russian ISP, Alexandre Ermakov, said he would appeal against the ruling and would not execute it because, in his view, he did not have the right to restrict access to information in the absence of any violation of the user conditions of the service offered. He added that he proposed several ways for filtering out access to the offending content, without blocking the entire domain name, but the court ignored him.

Describing the ruling as “contrary to the constitution,” Google said the content of the “Russia for the Russians” video could have been reported to the YouTube moderator as a violation of the user conditions.

Reporters Without Borders added Russia to its “Countries under surveillance” list in the March 2010 update of its “Enemies of the Internet” report (http://en.rsf.org/surveillance-russia,36671.html). The Internet became Russia’s freest medium for sharing information after the Kremlin brought the broadcast media under control at the start of the Putin era.

But the Internet’s independence is being threatened by arrests and prosecutions of bloggers and by the blocking of independent websites on the grounds of “extremist” content. The authorities are also themselves now using the Internet extensively for propaganda purposes.

YouTube has a lot of content, including the Russian president’s TV station.

Uyghur Webmasters Sentenced

By Tsering

2010/07/Gusjer1-e1280519957731.jpg

By Mihray Abdilim | Radio Free Asia | July 28, 2010    

HONG KONG—Three webmasters, all members of the Uyghur ethnic minority, have been sentenced to jail for publishing content deemed politically sensitive by the Chinese government, according to a brother of one of the men.

The defendants are Dilshat Perhat, webmaster and owner of Diyarim; Nureli, webmaster of Salkin; and Nijat Azat, webmaster of Shabnam. They were sentenced last week in Urumqi, capital of the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR) in northwestern China.

Dilmurat Perhat said his brother Dilshat Perhat received five years in prison, while Nureli and Nijat Azat received three years and 10 years, respectively, for “endangering state security.”

No official comment or confirmation was immediately available.

The verdicts were handed down in a series of closed trials at the Urumqi Intermediate People’s Court, Dilmurat Perhat said. All three websites publish online in the Uyghur language, spoken by the predominantly Muslim Uyghur ethnic minority.

Dilmurat Perhat, another webmaster for Diyarim who currently lives in England, had recently refused to speak with the media about his brother for fear of creating a more difficult situation for him in custody.

In April, after Beijing appointed Zhang Chunxian the new secretary of the Xinjiang regional committee, the family was visited by Chinese authorities who warned them to “make him shut up or his brother would be lost” in jail.

But after learning of his brother’s sentence and after their father’s recent death in the wake of Dilshat Perhat’s arrest in August last year, he agreed to a telephone interview.

“I have already lost my father and my brother, so now I will speak with the media,” Dilmurat Perhat said.

“To the media I would like to speak for freedom and justice for all Uyghur webmasters. I want the world media and other human rights organizations to call on the Chinese government to free all Uyghur webmasters and journalists.”

A friend of the family, who asked not to be named, said Dilshat Perhat’s mother was unable to attend her son’s trial because she was distraught over her husband’s recent death.

She refused to speak with the media because she remains concerned over her son’s treatment in jail.

Webmasters targeted

The verdicts follow the sentencing last week of another prominent, moderate Uyghur journalist and webmaster for talking to foreign media about July 2009 ethnic riots in Xinjiang which left nearly 200 people dead, according to official estimates.

Gheyret Niyaz was sentenced on July 23 by the Urumqi Intermediate People’s Court to 15 years in prison on charges of “endangering state security” and was given 15 days to appeal.

Niyaz, 51 and a former deputy director of the official Xinjiang Legal Daily, was employed at the official Xinjiang Economic Daily as a journalist at the time of his detention on Oct. 4, 2009.

His family received a warrant for his arrest four days later, relatives have said. Niyaz also served as webmaster and administrator of the Uyghur Online website, run by outspoken Uyghur economics professor Ilham Tohti.

In its 2009 annual report, the U.S. Congressional-Executive Commission on China (CECC) noted that Uyghur Online and its staff had been uniquely targeted after the 2009 violence.

“In spring 2009, authorities shut down the website Uyghur Online, a multi-language news and discussion forum that addressed issues of ethnicity in China, and interrogated Beijing-based scholar Ilham Tohti, who runs the site,” the report said.

“Authorities later detained Ilham Tohti in July after XUAR government chairperson Nur Bekri alleged that Ilham Tohti’s website contributed to incitement of rioting in Urumqi on July 5. Authorities released Ilham Tohti from detention on Aug. 2. The whereabouts of some other Uyghur Online staff members are reportedly unknown.”

Following the region’s July 5, 2009 unrest, Nur Bekri took a firm stance against Uyghur webmasters’ publishing of information related to the incident.

“These websites publish so much bad news about what happened at the Shaoguan Toy Factory between Uyghur and Chinese workers,” he said, referring to a brawl in southern China that left two Uyghurs dead and touched off Uyghur protests in Urumqi.

“They say Uyghur workers died and carry similar kinds of news and this led to the July 5 event in Urumqi.”

Not long after Nur Bekri’s statement, Chinese police began arresting several Uyghur webmasters in Urumqi and other cities in the XUAR.

Simmering tensions

Millions of Uyghurs—a distinct, Turkic minority who are predominantly Muslim—populate Central Asia and the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR) of northwestern China.

Ethnic tensions between Uyghurs and majority Han Chinese settlers have simmered for years, and erupted in July 2009 in rioting that left some 200 people dead, according to the Chinese government’s tally.

Uyghurs say they have long suffered ethnic discrimination, oppressive religious controls, and continued poverty and joblessness despite China’s ambitious plans to develop its vast northwestern frontier.

Chinese authorities blame Uyghur separatists for a series of deadly attacks in recent years and accuse one group in particular of maintaining links to the al-Qaeda terrorist network.

Google Says Censorship Not Obstacle to Its Middle East Growth

By Tsering

Flickr Creative Commons | Camera Eye

By Vivian Salama &  Heidi Couch | Bloomberg | July 28, 2010

Google Inc., owner of the world’s most popular Internet search engine, said it’s not hindered in the Middle East by government-backed censorship as it seeks to ride growing opportunities in the region.

“We tend to operate in a very, very competitive industry, so users are generally one click away from changing their preferences,” Ari Kesisoglu, manager for Google Middle East, said in a Bloomberg Television interview in Dubai. “We are not censoring our own information, and we’ve never been asked to.”

Google, based in Mountain View, California, is seeking to gain ground in the Middle East, where it estimates that less than 15 percent of the residents go online. The company went public with a dispute in China in January, saying it was no longer willing to comply with filtering regulations.
 
“If you want to play ball in China or the Middle East or basically any other country outside, you’ve got to play by the local rules,” said Jin Yoon, an analyst at Nomura Holdings Inc. in Hong Kong. “If you don’t play by the local rules, you essentially have to mark yourself out of the market.”
 
China’s government confirmed that it renewed Google’s Internet license, after the U.S. company’s local venture pledged to allow regulators to supervise its Web content, the official Xinhua news agency said July 11. The move gives Google a chance to win search share lost to market leader Baidu Inc. and woo advertisers put off by its dispute with the government.
 
“Whatever happened in China is completely exceptional and it doesn’t result in us making any decisions globally,” Kesisoglu said.
 
Middle East Censorship
 
In many Middle Eastern countries, television programs and films cut out nudity, physical intimacy or homosexual scenes. Internet firewalls are common across the region, particularly in the Persian Gulf, where several countries ban popular websites such as Skype and Flickr. Websites that are critical of Islam or ruling political regimes are often blocked.
 
In August, Yahoo! Inc. purchased Maktoob.com, providing it with an entry point into a market that includes 22 countries and more than 350 million Arabic speakers. Maktoob is the largest portal in the Arab world with 16 million monthly users. Vodafone Egypt last year purchased Sarmady, a Cairo-based provider of digital content.
 
“Google, Yahoo, help the region and lobby the government for less censorship,” said Samih Toukan, founder of Maktoob.com. “We lobby as local people because censorship hurts us, it hurts innovation it hurts growth.”
 
Bloggers Arrested
 
Global Voices Online, an international bloggers’ network, has documented 206 cases of bloggers under arrest or threat, mostly in China, Egypt and Iran. In Egypt and Iran, online political activists have been arrested and prosecuted after rallying in support of opposition parties.
 
Restrictions stretch beyond the Web and films. In the United Arab Emirates, Research In Motion Ltd.’s BlackBerry smartphones may be subject to monitoring if the government is able to bring communications by the handheld devices under emergency and security rules.
 
Blackberry devices, introduced in the U.A.E. in 2006, are not covered by the country’s 2007 Safety, Emergency and National Security rules, the Telecommunications Regulatory Authority said July 25.

Iranian Social Networking, Hard-Line Style

By Tsering

Flickr Creative Commons | 27389271

By Golnaz Esfandiari | Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty | July 28, 2010

“The website of the followers of Khamenei has been created. Please enter with your hijab and after completing your ablution.”

With that Facebook post, 29-year-old Iranian Ahmad heralded the arrival of a new social-networking site, called “Velayatmadaran,” launched by the Iranian establishment.

The name is a reference to “followers of the velayat,” or Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and it’s part of an attempt by Iranian officials to get in on the social-networking craze. Like other sites that have proved to be crucial tools for communication, discussion, and the exchange of news and information among members of the opposition — including Facebook — Velayatmadaran allows users to network and post pictures, videos, and articles.

Predictably, given his support for Iran’s political opposition, Ahmad’s status update, the messages that go out to Facebook “friends,” became an immediate hit. There was an explosion of sarcastic comments from his friends. One wrote that he would join the website on condition that his friends promise not to tag him in pictures of President Mahmud Ahmadinejad and hard-line cleric Ahmad Khatami. Another mocked that “the networking site is a dream come true.”

Iranian officials have smeared such social networkers as lackeys of Iran’s enemies and victims of a “soft war” being waged against Tehran.

For his part, Ahmad thinks Velayatmadaran holds little attraction for young Iranians: “[The hard-liners] are losing their supporters from top to bottom. It’s clear just from the name of the site that it is designed for their own supporters.”

If You Can’t Beat ‘Em…

According to the “About Us” section, the site was launched to create an online platform for the religious hard-liners of Iran’s Hezbollah to exchange ideas and fight “evil.” Issues like “the rule of the supreme jurist” and “women and family” are up for discussion.

So far, the site has attracted some 3,000 members and includes posts of pictures of “Imam Khamenei,” a reference that seeks to elevate the current supreme leader beyond his clerical status; articles about the teachings of ultra-hard-line Ayatollah Mesbah Yazdi; and cartoons skewering the opposition Green Movement.

Iranians putting the Internet to use in Qom, a hub of Shi’ite activity.

In the aftermath of Iran’s disputed election in 2009, social-networking sites were filled with images and comments related to the protests over the reelection of President Ahmadinejad. Despite official attempts to limit the free flow of information, word of the use of force by government forces spread quickly.

Velayatmadaran’s creators write that “the enemy” has recently used social-networking websites for its own benefit and for “spreading lies.” They say that while that same enemy has used the virtual world “skillfully” and social-networking sites as a “weapon,” Hezbollah has relied on its “faith and correct belief.” It’s time to fight fire with fire, they argue.

Ali Honari, a 32-year-old sociology student who has been living and studying in Holland for nearly a year, sees little to attract Iranian young people. He says the new website appears to be an attempt by the Iranian authorities to funnel their supporters away from mainstream social networking or from engaging in open debate.

“A friend of mine who taught some courses at the Qom seminary said that even there, students are becoming increasingly modern,” Honari says. “They have access to the Internet, they watch the latest movies. [The establishment] needs to make sure they remain loyal.”

Toronto-based Iranian blogger Arash Kamangir says he doubts Velayatmadaran will attract many members. “It’s not difficult to launch a new social site,” he says. “What is difficult is to attract members. [Iranian leaders] cannot do it, because they don’t want to open these sites to those who are opposed to them and their supporters don’t seem to be many.”

He adds that Velayatmadaran looks suspiciously like a sort of “training camp” for hard-liners to gain familiarity with social-networking sites. “They see it as a military camp where they can receive training,” Kamangir says. “They say that the next steps will be to go out and take some [action].”

‘Cyberwar’

New York-based journalist Roozbeh Mirebrahimi, who was jailed in Iran in 2004 over his online writings, says the creation of Velayatmadaran and other similar moves — such as the launching of hard-line blogs — is the result of Tehran viewing the Internet as a threat.

“The Islamic republic and the security military organs that are behind such projects make a big mistake by thinking that online tools — blogs and now social-networking websites — themselves have the power to influence,” Mirebrahimi says. “It’s a wrong belief, these are only tools — the ideas that are being discussed within these tools are [what is] important.”

The Iranian establishment has for years fought a cyber-battle on several fronts. It has reportedly blocked and hacked websites, tracked activists online, and threatened Iranians who have turned to blogs and other online platforms to express themselves. It has prosecuted and jailed some people based on their online content.

But the Iranian establishment has faced fierce and determined opposition by activists and intellectuals, who have used proxy sites and antifiltering tools to bypass government censorship.

One web developer in Tehran, who spoke on condition of anonymity out of fear for his safety, says activists seem to be winning the cyber-battle. “The government blocks [and] young citizens find a way to unblock the filtered website,” he says. “They manage to spread the news the government wants to censor.”

One Friday Prayers leader, Ayatollah Alam Ahdi, effectively acknowledged as much last week. He said during a public appearance in Mashhad that “the enemy” has occupied the virtual world, adding that the “cyberwar” should be taken seriously. “If, for example, we have inside and outside the country 10 million bloggers, 9.5 million of them are against Islam,” he said.

He advocated using “any tool,” even if contravened Shari’a, or Islamic law. “In a war, anti-Shari’a [moves] are permissible; the same applies to a cyberwar,” Alam Ahdi said. “The conditions are such that you should fight the enemy in any way you can. You don’t need to be considerate of anyone. If you don’t hit them, the enemy will hit you.”

Honari, the doctoral candidate studying abroad, says he thinks the Iranian establishment is fighting a losing battle. “All the sites that are popular are sites where users can discuss and express their critical views [freely],” he says. “That’s against the views and principles of an authoritarian regime. The Iranian government cannot use the Internet properly.”

As far as Velayatmadaran goes, he says a critical dialogue is impossible. “What would they do with someone like me with opposed views if I became a member?” Honari asks. “They would have to delete me over and over.”

What Does the Global Network Initiative Tell Us About the Value of Multi-Stakeholder Initiatives?

By Tsering

Flickr Creative Commons | Bruce Irving

By Dustan Allison Hope | BSR Blog | July 9, 2010

I didn’t know it at the time, but it was a phone call that would change my life. It was November 2005, and a group of internet companies wanted BSR and Harvard’s Berkman Center to help explore the human rights to privacy and freedom of expression that were of growing risk in many markets around the world.

It’s now July 2010, and I’ve just facilitated my final meeting of the Global Network Initiative (GNI). I’ve completed a handover to the young organization’s new executive director, Susan Morgan. In the intervening four and half years, BSR joined forces with the Center for Democracy and Technology to run a consensus-building process that culminated, in October 2008, with the launch of the GNI and the publication of new Principles and Implementation Guidelines on Freedom of Expression and Privacy.

During this time, I’ve helped run 22 in-person multi-stakeholder meetings, drafted and re-drafted hundreds of documents, and spent thousands of hours on the phone. Considering the hours invested by other participants, this adds up to human time and effort on a gigantic scale.

This got me wondering: Was it worth it? What does the experience of the last four and a half years tell us about the significance of multi-stakeholder initiatives such as the GNI?

Looking back to late 2005, it is striking how much has changed:

* First, new standards have emerged where previously there were none. The Principles and Implementation Guidelines offer valuable direction to companies in the communications industry on what to do when faced with demands from governments that may lead to violations of user rights to privacy and freedom of expression.

* Second, whole new avenues of collaboration on human rights issues among companies, NGOs, academics, and investors have opened up. In the face of increasingly significant policy- and regulatory-based moves around the world that threaten user-generated content and privacy, a new coalition of networked and informed advocates has been created.

* Third, and significantly, two new communities have emerged: communities of people inside internet companies who are now much more familiar with human rights, and communities of people inside human rights organizations who now have a much better understanding of the implications of new technology. With communications technology increasingly pervasive in our modern lives—and with growing challenges to individuals’ human rights—this development is not one to be underestimated.

There is still, of course, much more to do, and no one should be under any illusions that a multi-stakeholder initiative on its own will lead to the type of systemic change that we all want to see. In particular, I’d highlight three challenges, all of which are very well known to the GNI:

* First, much greater participation from all parts of the information and communications technology ecosystem—not just internet companies—is required if future IT networks are to be designed to protect human rights.

* Second, much greater participation is required from companies, NGOs, and academics from outside the United States and northern Europe if the impact of the GNI is to be truly global.

* And finally, a huge challenge remains to engage and influence the government entities that are increasingly pulling the private sector (usually unwillingly) into violations of freedom of expression and privacy.

The GNI has brought together a diverse group of determined and driven individuals and organizations that have the opportunity to play a significant role in the protection of human rights in the internet age. It won’t succeed in protecting human rights alone; but neither are we likely to protect freedom of expression and privacy without it. It is my assumption that this same conclusion—that a multi-stakeholder initiative is a necessary but not sufficient driver of change—can be made for other similar efforts.

Dunstan Allison Hope is coauthor of Big Business, Big Responsibilities (Palgrave Macmillan 2010). This book considers the impact of corporate responsibility over the past decade and includes a chapter analyzing the emergence of the Global Network Initiative.

China’s star blogger treads fine line

By Tsering

Flickr Creative Commons | Scott Chang

By Polly Hui | AFP | July 23, 2010

HONG KONG — China’s most popular blogger recalls being baffled when a publisher told him he could not run an article because it mentioned a person ordering a dish of lamb.

“I did not get it. What’s wrong with eating lamb?” Han Han says.

The publisher explained that by ordering lamb, the diner could be someone who did not eat pork.

And that could imply he was a Muslim — a particularly sensitive subject in China following deadly ethnic unrest in Xinjiang last year that pitted mostly Muslim Uighurs against the nation’s dominant Han group.

The 27-year-old high school drop-out and champion amateur race-car driver said he was frustrated that self-censorship by mainland publishers was often more stringent than the authorities themselves.

“I wish there was a law saying clearly what can be done and what can’t be. I wish we could lay all the issues on the table and discuss frankly about them.”

Han, famous for his witty, scathing critiques of China’s corrupt officials and social issues, has achieved phenomenal fame in the country’s tightly monitored cyberspace.

He has accumulated more than 300 million hits on his blog, making it the most popular in China — and probably the world.

A top-earning author with a dozen titles under his belt, Han was named by TIME magazine as among the world’s 100 most influential people, grouping him alongside US President Barack Obama and pop star Lady Gaga.

He said he had also recently rejected an invitation to promote a commercial product on his blog with the reward of 10,000 yuan (1,500 US dollars) for each word he writes — with no word limit.

“Some people are beneficiaries of a flawed judicial system. Some are beneficiaries of a chaotic society. I just happen to have benefited from telling the truth,” he recently told reporters at the Hong Kong Book Fair.

Han conceded that technological advances have played a vital role in his success.

“In the Internet era, once an article is posted online, there is nothing one can do to deny its existence,” Han said, referring to the fact that his readers always managed to copy contentious articles from his blog to their own sites — before they were taken down by China’s Internet police.

Before the launch of his popular literature-themed magazine “Party” this month, Han said he spent time and money consulting different publishers in the futile hope of preserving the articles in their original form.

“It is about making compromise all the time,” he said. “I still had to follow the rules because I wanted the magazine to be a legal publication.”

All 500,000 copies of the bi-monthly’s first issue, which included articles by other writers, sold out just four days after its release, government newspaper China Daily reported, smashing sales records.

For many, Han is the unofficial voice for China’s “Post 80s”, a generation born into the country’s economic boom who are typically regarded as spoilt as the single child in the family, apolitical, rebellious and status-obsessed.

Han shot to fame in 2000 after he published “The Triple Gate”, a novel based on his own experience as a school drop-out in Shanghai that mocked China’s rigid education system.

He has criticised China’s “underground Internet commentators” — hired by the government to skew public opinion by posting comments online favourable to the authorities.

The blogger also likes to ridicule officials’ conservative and outmoded approach to handling crises.

“Sometimes, the incident itself was not a big deal. But it was blown up by the government officials themselves,” he said.

After a man stabbed 32 people — mostly small children — at a kindergarten in eastern China in April, he wrote: “By controlling the media, prohibiting hospital visits, diverting attention, the (local) government managed to re-direct people’s anger towards the killer to the government itself.”

Despite his bravado, some critics have pointed out that Han has always been careful not to challenge the one-party rule of the Communist Party.

Han himself admits that he abides by the rigid — if unwritten — rules to ensure that his voice continues to be heard.

Asked about his views on the crackdown on the 1989 pro-democracy protests in Tiananmen Square, he changed subject.

“I fell in love with this girl in the mainland a few days ago,” he said.

“She’s worried that if I said anything anti-government, I won’t be allowed back to China.”

Three Years On, Cyber Crime Law Stifling Debate – Critics

By Tsering

Flickr Creative Commons | Tim Parkinson

By Lynette Lee Corporal | The Asia Media Forum*| July 23, 2010

BANGKOK, Jul 23 (IPS) – Many netizens worldwide have long realised that the Internet is not completely without fetters, but those in Thailand say a three-year-old law is now practically choking Thai self-expression and right to information in cyberspace.

More to the point, Thai netizens, journalists and media advocates say that the country’s authorities have taken advantage of ambiguities in the Cyber Crime Act (CCA) to censor or close down altogether websites or forums that the government deems “offensive”.

“The problem with the cyber crime law is its lack of clarity, which leaves it wide open to misinterpretation,” Chiranuch Premchaiporn, director of the yet-to-be-unblocked independent news website Prachatai (‘Free People’), told a discussion here this week to review and propose amendments to the law.

Already, reports of prosecution under the computer crime law have driven much political discussion underground. Others worry this is discouraging people from debating key issues in the public sphere, especially amid the political divisions in Thailand that led to the largest protests in decades by the anti-government United Front for Democracy against Dictatorship and the military’s subsequent crackdown in May.

Already, “the authorities’ actions are driving the growth of underground forums and space,” adds Chiranuch.

The actions of Thailand’s online censors “will cause people to drop off from the discussion of issues”, agrees South-east Asia Press Alliance Executive Director Roby Alampay. “Only the truly determined and technologically savvy will continue to find ways to express their voices online,” he adds.

Critics say that the government has been on an intensive cybercrackdown in the last two years. The international media watchdog Reporters Without Borders says that in July 2009 alone, the information and communications technology (ICT) ministry, citing threats to national security, blocked more than 16,944 websites.

Internet freedom activists say that as of this year, the number has reached more than 50,000, adding that it is difficult to get a clear figure of exactly how many websites have been blocked.

Likewise, “it is difficult to say how many have been charged under the CCA.” said independent media lawyer Sinfah Tunsarawuth. “There are at least 10, but we don’t know if there are more as defendants don’t want to talk and would rather settle out of court. It’s also difficult to track down individual court cases.”

Thailand, a country of 68 million people, has 13.4 million Internet users, with 113 Internet service providers (ISPs) licensed as of July 2009.

Netizens say the CCA has enabled authorities to step up the online clampdown. Other regulations in place that affect the online community and media include the emergency decree that the government imposed in April and remains in effect in Bangkok and several provinces, and which allows it to shut websites deemed to detrimental to security.

Among the websites that have been blocked since April is Prachatai. Even before that, Chiranuch herself was charged with violating Section 15 of the computer crime act for postings made on Prachatai’s web board that were allegedly in breach of the lese majeste law.

CCA critics also cite the law’s Section 14 as being problematic. It covers offences such as the uploading of material deemed “likely to” threaten any person as well as national security or sow panic among the public, Sinfah’s report says.

“If anyone is seen as ‘likely to’ harm national security, it doesn’t have to happen but that person is already liable,” he told IPS recently. Against the backdrop of legal restrictions on expression, Thai Netizen Network committee member Sarinee Achavanuntakul says that there is a need to distinguish between threats to national security and the expression of opinion. “We should be able to define what constitutes dangerous content,” she says.

But one hindrance to this, says Thai Journalists Association president Prasong Lertratanawisut, is that implementing bodies such as the ICT can easily be “led by political agendas”.

Political analyst Suranan Vejjajiva adds that the Thai authorities’ notion of control is through the use of propaganda. “The bureaucratic system has so many laws, rules and regulations that give universal power to the person holding office,” he also says. “They think that control or shutting down websites, for instance, gives more security but, in fact, reflects insecurity.”

TNN’s Sarinee believes as well that the government does not really understand the nature of the Internet and that, unlike the more traditional forms of media, it simply is impossible to censor it.

At the same time, she worries that “unless you make it a very personal thing” and show people how censorship affects their own lives, they would not to care to react to the government’s current sweep through the Web.

Prachatai, however, seems to be waving a white flag, and is closing down its controversial web board end of July. Chiranuch, who says past comments on the board have led to the arrest of several people, explains, “We don’t want to mislead users that we can protect them online.”

“We’d rather shut down the web board than collect our users’ personal data,” she also says, referring to a provision in the law that directs Internet providers to collect and store online users’ personal information for 90 days.

Comments Suranan: “Sharing is the heart of the new Internet culture where everybody is a stakeholder. Unfortunately, the government and other organisations can’t seem to come to grips with this and are refusing to understand that the world has changed.”

*The Asia Media Forum (http://www.theasiamediaforum.org) is a space for journalists to share insights on issues related to the media and their profession. It is coordinated by IPS Asia-Pacific.

Human rights defender held since mid-June on charge of “annoying others”

By Tsering

Flickr Creative Commons | Sergio

Reporters Sans Frontieres | July 22, 2010

Middle East & North Africa – Saudi Arabia

Reporters Without Borders calls for the immediate and unconditional release of Sheikh Mekhlef bin Dahham al-Shammari, a writer, human rights activist and social reformer who was arrested on 15 June and who has yet to be taken before a judge.

His arrest is believed to have been prompted by his criticism of political and religious leaders, especially in articles posted on the Saudiyoon (www.saudiyoon.com)and Rasid (www.rasid.com) news websites. The main charge listed in his case file is the fanciful one of “annoying others.”

“This is far from being the first arbitrary detention in Saudi Arabia but this case borders on the ridiculous,” Reporters Without Borders said. “If they are holding Al-Shammari just for upsetting or annoying people, then a lot of Saudis are going to end up in prison.”

The press freedom organisation added: “His arrest is a blow to free speech and belies the Saudi government’s claims, to the United Nations in particular, that it is making progress on human rights. The international community must press for the release of Al-Shammari, a person committed to human values and entirely praiseworthy causes.”

Al-Shammari has been arrested several times in recent years, in part because of his defence of Saudi Arabia’s Shiite minority. This year, his articles criticising the conservative interpretations of Islam promoted by Saudi officials led to his being arrested on 15 May and then released on bail. His latest arrest took place on 15 June in Jubail. He was transferred to Damman prison at the start of this month.

Ibrahim Al Mugaiteeb, the founder and head of the Human Rights First Society, said that, prior to this arrest, Al-Shammari had given him a special power of attorney to defend him. “Mr. Al-Shammari’s arrest is illegal. The prosecutor-general’s office has no evidence against him. His detention is a flagrant violation of freedom of expression.”

Al-Shammari often writes about poverty and unemployment, accusing the government of ignoring these problems because it is obsessed with public morality and keeping men and women apart. He has also highlighted the government’s failure to promote tourism and its discrimination against the Shiite minority.

Although a Sunni, he was very critical of the influential Saudi preacher Mohammed al-Arifi for referring to one of Iran’s most respected Shiite clerics, Grand Ayatollah Ali al Sistani, as an “obscene atheist.”

Information Bridging on the Case of Tibetan Environmentalist Karma Samdrup

By Tsering

By Dechen Pemba | Global Voices Online | July 21, 2010 

The case of well-known Tibetan environmentalist, businessman and philanthropist Karma Samdrup, sentenced to 15 years in prison on June 24, 2010, by a court in Xinjiang, has been highly unusual in that those monitoring the case were able to see events unfolding almost in real time, thanks to the blog and Twitter output of Karma Samdrup’s wife, Dolkar Tso, and Karma Samdrup’s lawyer, the reknowned Chinese civil rights lawyer, Pu Zhiqiang. 

The trial of Karma Samdrup that started on June 22 ended with his heavy sentencing on June 24 on charges of “grave-robbing”, charges that had actually been dropped 12 years earlier by the authorities. Throughout those few days of the trial, Pu Zhiqiang was using Twitter to document the case as it unfolded. The verdict of 15 years was made known to Pu Zhiqiang’s followers, over 10.000 of them, just hours after it was announced. Below is a screenshot of Pu Zhiqiang’s Tweet announcing the verdict: 

At the same time, Karma Samdrup’s wife, Dolkar Tso, also present in the courtroom in Xinjiang for the duration of the trial, was also documenting events and writing about her thoughts and feelings on her blog, hosted on the popular Chinese blog portal Sohu.com. Below is a screenshot of one of Dolkar Tso’s early blogs: 

Screenshot of Dolkar Tso's blog on Sohu.com

Dolkar Tso persistently continued to use Sohu as her blog-hosting site despite her blog being closed down several times. Dolkar Tso’s blogging activities were monitored and reported by Tibetan writer, poet and blogger Woeser on her blog. Woeser was often quick to re-post articles from both Dolkar Tso and Pu Zhiqiang’s blogs before the posts were removed. 

According to Woeser’s blogposts, Dolkar Tso opened several blogs one after the other starting on June 2 with http://drolkartso.blog.sohu.com, the day when it was suddenly announced that the date of Karma Samdrup’s trial was to be postponed. This blog was shut down after just one day. 

The second blog, http://drolkar.blog.sohu.com/ was started on June 21 but was closed down after 5 days, shortly after Karma Samdrup’s sentence was announced. The post that Dolkar Tso wrote on her second blog, expressing her worries for her husband titled “Praying” was translated into English by High Peaks Pure Earth and subsequently quoted in an article in TIME magazine: 

“The account we heard … exceeded our worst imaginations,” his wife Dolkar Tso wrote in a blog post that was translated by High Peaks Pure Earth, a website that monitors Tibetan source material. “We heard about hundreds of different cruel torture methods, maltreatment around the clock, hitherto unheard of torture instruments and drugs, hard and soft tactics, and even of fellow prisoners being grouped together to extract a confession.” 

The third blog http://drolkar3.blog.sohu.com/, started on June 27 was closed down after 6 days on July 3. 

The fourth blog http://drolkar4.blog.sohu.com/ was started on July 3, the day that Karma Samdrup’s brother, environmentalist Rinchen Samdrup, was sentenced to 5 years in prison in a separate case taking place in Chamdo, Tibet. The blog was closed down after 3 days. 

The fifth blog http://drolkar5.blog.sohu.com/ was started on July 6 and appears to still be online at the time of writing, below is a screenshot of the blog: 

Screenshot of Dolkar Tso's Fifth Blog

Underneath her photograph on her blog is this passage: 

“Regardless of nationality, regardless of geography, seek only mercy and justice. No lies, no flattery, only perseverance and calm. What good comes of deleting this post or this blog?” 

Dolkar Tso (1) and Pu Zhiqiang (centre) in Xinjiang

Lawyer Pu Zhiqiang’s personal blog survived the duration of the trial and crucially he was even able to photograph and upload all 10 pages of Karma Samdrup’s sentencing documents on the evening of the sentencing. The documents were re-posted almost immediately on Woeser’s blog. 

However, on July 15, the blog was closed down, below is the error message that appears when trying to access http://puzhiqianglawyer.blog.sohu.com/ 

Since then, Pu Zhiqiang has been blogging on a new blog but still hosted on Sohu: http://lawyerpuzhiqiang.blog.sohu.com/ As he notes in the top bar of the blog, it is his 13th blog. A few days ago, ChinaGeeks reported that lawyer and blogger Liu Xiaoyuan had his Sohu blog closed down on July 12, 2010. 

Whilst an unprecedented amount of information was reaching the internet and the wider world throughout this case, what is also demonstrated here is the sheer persistence and determination required by civil society activists in the PRC to be heard using social media, as well as the importance of online networks of support to re-post articles and to spread the word on shuttered blogs that may have moved or reincarnated elsewhere.

India: From Stone Pelting In Kashmir Streets To Facebook Protests

By Tsering

Flickr Creative Commons | Tanvir Kohli

By Rezwan | Global Voices Online | July 18, 2010

The beautiful Kashmir Region is marred with territorial conflicts between India, Pakistan and China since the British colonial rulers left India in 1947. Amidst a few wars all these countries have made claims to different parts of Kashmir, based on historical developments and religious affiliations of the Kashmiri people.

The Jammu and Kashmir region is administered by India but enjoys special autonomy under Article 370 of the Constitution of India. It is also the only Indian state that has its own flag. Since the late 1980s a violent uprising backed by Pakistan has caused a prolonged, bloody conflict between militants and the Indian security forces in this region. The Indian Army in Jammu and Kashmir has been given special powers via Armed Forces Act, which has been widely criticized.Kashmir is boiling over tension and rage since early June when it was revealed that Indian security forces allegedly killed three innocent boys and claimed they were militants. Violent protests ensued which brought part of the region in standstill and hundreds of Kashmiri youths were arrested. Jason Oberdorf at Global Post explains the recent volatile situation in Jammu and Kashmir:

Late Tuesday (July 6, 2010) night, New Delhi deployed the army to quell protests in Kashmir for the first time since 1990, after police bullets allegedly killed three more civilians, bringing the total for the month to 15. [..]

Facebook and other social networking sites are brimming with outpourings of rage, bordering on hatred for India’s security forces, from Kashmiri youth.

Reading reports about Kashmir may get tricky depending on the source. While a Pakistani media would interpret the stone pelting protests with headlines such as “Kashmir shuts down protesting Indian occupation: Want freedom, Pakistan“, an Indian media would label the stone pelting as provocations by anti-national elements. There are reports that the Indian media may be allegedly fabricating blames.Apart from tackling the stone throwing protesters the Indian military now faces a new form of insurgency. Protesters are increasingly using social media tools like Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, hi5, Orkut and Kashmir Friend, which is a social network dedicated to the people of Kashmir. Simantik Dowerah at Live Mint reports that “there are actually groups of Kashmiri stone throwers who have registered themselves on Facebook.” The Kashmir reports with screenshots how the youths are being instigated by sharing Jihadi videos.As the violence escalated, the Jammu and Kashmir Government banned the SMS service across the valley in an attempt to stop the flow of information and rumors. But the Kashmiris could breathe free, stay connected and share information via Facebook as Hindustan Times reported. Many news websites like Kashmir Dispatch and Kashmir are using Facebook to reach netizens.

Amidst all this there are reports that Facebook users are being screened by Police. The Daily Rising Kashmir reports that the authorities have now started scrutinizing Facebook users in South Kashmir’s Anantnag (previously Islamabad) district who they claim are ‘instigating’ people against the state.Sagar From Srinagar writes in protest in his blog “Tragedy Of Errors: My Kashmir”, which sums up the pain of the Kashmiris:

I protest for the incompetency of the people handling my future, I protest for the lack of humanity in our (in)security forces, I Protest for the repeated insults, I protest for media using my pain for their TRPs, I protest for the short sightedness of all our leaders, I protest for none of them coming out submissively and asking for forgiveness, I protest for being ordered to be locked up in my house for no fault of mine, I protest for anyone, but never a Kashmiri, getting his 5 minutes of fame on tv, I protest for the unnecessary and insensitive comments made about my place, I protest for journalists telling the world just one side of the story…

Being Cynical at Desicritics blames the policies and politics as a reason for the protests:

Traditionally Kashmiris feel alienated- thanks to our policies and our politician’s attitude to keep the Kashmir topic alive for their own gain. If you look at the video footage, it is really disturbing to see teenagers barely in their twenties are hurling stones at the security forces. On a micro analysis you would realize that these are the same guys who would have born when Kashmir was at peak of it’s boiling point and their whole life till now has gone through violence, atrocities, negligence, no governance and of course the terrorists. [..]

I am sure the majority of these teenagers who are seen protesting violently might not be knowing for what they are protesting or on whom they are pelting stones.Some analysts are labeling these protests as the ‘new Intifada’. Arjimand Hussain Talib at Dateline Srinagar opines about the protests of Kashmiri youths:

Their movement will not die down because this generation is dynamic – stretches across the globe. It has technology at its hand – Internet, mobiles phones, digital cameras, You Tube, Facebook, etc. They are archiving Kashmir’s current happenings for the next generation. And are disseminating that to the world beyond to catch attention.

There are reports that the local government is trying to control the flow of information by shutting down publications and confiscating newspapers prior to distribution. Journalists are being barred from reporting on demonstrations. The world will rely on Facebook and Twitter users for first hand reports from the region. But after the SMS ban will the Jammu and Kashmir government crack down on Social networks too?