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Deutsch: Netzsperren: Zunehmender Druck auf die Türkei

As Turkey continues its ban on Google's YouTube and other services, it attracts more and more criticism. After Turkey's President Abdullah Gul himself has taken position against its own government in this matter, it is now OSCE turn to react.

On 22 June 2010, Dunja Mijatovic, the OSCE Representative on Freedom of the Media, asked the Turkish authorities to restore access to Google's YouTube and other services and change the much-criticized Law No. 5651 (so-called Internet Law) in order to be in line with international standards on free expression. "I ask the Turkish authorities to revoke the blocking provisions that prevent citizens from being part of today's global information society. I also ask them to carry out a very much needed reform of Law No. 5651," said Mijatovic.

OSCE representative has sent a letter to Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu, showing concern about the new blocking decisions taken at the beginning of June when the ban was extended to other Google services such as Google Translate or Google Docs.

The Turkish Communication Minister Binali Yildirim has lately argued that the reason of banning Google services is related to tax disputes and has accused Google of infringing the Turkish law and of failing to cooperate with the Turkish authorities. "This site is waging a battle against the Turkish." But not even the flawed Internet Law includes tax disputes among the reasons for blocking websites, as was pointed out by Mijatovic who added: "My office has been promoting the urgent reform of Law No. 5651, because it considerably limits freedom of expression and severely restricts citizens' right to access information."

Google, in its turn, is confident it complies with tax laws in every country where it operates. "We are currently in discussion with the Turkish authorities about this, and are confident we comply with Turkish law. We report profits in Turkey which are appropriate for the activities of our Turkish operations," was Google's statement.

A petition has been signed by hundreds of Internet users denouncing the ban as an affront to "free speech and rights to access information" and calling for Binali Yildirim's resignation. Three information technology groups are challenging the ban in courts.

Richard Howitt, a British member of the European Parliament and advocate of Turkey's European Union membership, has warned Turkey that the ban puts "the country alongside Iran, North Korea and Vietnam as one of the world's worst offenders for cyber censorship" and the country cannot expect to be considered as a serious candidate for the EU as long as it continues to censor the Internet.

On 18 June 2010, as a protest against the decision taken by the Turkish Government, a group of hackers co-ordinated a DoS attack that lasted 10 hours against the websites of the Ministry of Transportation, Information and Communication Technologies Authority and the Telecommunications Communication Presidency, the authorities that have been directly involved in the banning.

OSCE media freedom representative asks Turkey to withdraw recent Internet blocking provisions, calls for urgent reform of law (22.06.2010)
http://www.osce.org/item/44754.html

Turkey tightens Internet control in YouTube feud (26.06.2010)
http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5iPZmDTKYEB6SFdyOAv97...

OSCE calls on Turkey to stop blocking YouTube (22.06.2010)
http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE65L3MP20100622

Access Denied to Turkish Censorship Authorities' websites (18.06.2010)
http://cyberlaw.org.uk/2010/06/18/access-denied-to-turkish-censorship-...

EDRi-gram: Turkey extends the censorship of YouTube (16.06.2010)
http://www.edri.org/edrigram/number8.12/turkey-extends-blocking-youtub...