AfterDawn: News

YouTube banned in Turkey, again

According to reports today the extremely popular video sharing site YouTube has been banned in Turkey because of clips that allegedly insult the country's founder.

This situation marks the second time Turkey has banned the site and for the same reason. It is actually illegal to insult the national icon, Mustafa Kemal Ataturk and Turkish courts have deemed twice that YouTube left clips up that insulted him.



In March 2007, the site was banned for two days in Turkey until offending videos were taken down.

Turkey is not the first country to block YouTube however. Last year the Thai government blocked access to the popular site for 4 months because of clips the government deemed "offensive" towards the Thai monarch King Bhumibol Adulyadej. In Morocco, access was blocked in early May after videos were posted that were "critical of Morocco's treatment of the people of Western Sahara, a territory that Morocco took control of in 1975." The Moroccan government never officially spoke of the ban and called it a "technical glitch" that only affected YouTube.

Written by: Andre Yoskowitz @ 20 Jan 2008 17:03

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• 7 comments

• sssharp

  Those leaders need to understand the people posting the clips live or lived in their countries. The insults are what you do or have done to your own citizens. Fix your problems.

  20.1.2008 22:28 #1

• attar

  Pranksters are also barred from shouting 'Fire' in a crowded theatre.
  That prevents panic among the patrons with the secondary benefit being that the prankster doesn't get lynched.

  21.1.2008 06:11 #2

• chaos_zzz

  what? no free speech? thanks lord i'm not a turkey guy .....

  21.1.2008 10:22 #3

• ZimHosein

  Quote:According to reports today the extremely popular video sharing site YouTube has been banned in Turkey because of clips that allegedly insult the country's founder.... and yet for the first time that I can personally recall, I saw a few commercials broad-casted on TV this evening for goTurkey.com I wonder what the countries founder would think about advertising in a country that hosts clips that insult him? Something to think about no?

  22.1.2008 00:29 #4

• twosocks

  if that were the case here in the US then youtube would be banned forever

  22.1.2008 12:24 #5

• borhan9

  I feel all countries around the worl need their own version of youtube soo that if countries like this need to police it that has to be a way to do it.

  17.2.2008 01:52 #6

• omax0

  Turkey has reimposed ban on youtube after giving access on october 30 2010 for few days. http://techshrimp.com/2010/11/03/turkey-imposes-youtube-ban-again/
  

  3.11.2010 07:05 #7