Thailand blocks access to website after royal insult

Bangkok -Thailand’s military installed government on Wednesday blocked a popular website that has been featuring a mocking video on the country’s revered King Bhumibol Adulyadej. Efforts to access to the YouTube website were diverted to a Ministry of Information website instead. The
blockage followed Information and Communications Technology Minister Sitthichai Pookaiyaudom’s order to shut down any websites deemed to be violating the orders issued by the leaders of the September 19 coup d’etat that ousted former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra. Sitthichai said the ministry had the authority to block any websites considered to have committed lese majeste or seen as a threat to national security. A video clip was posted on the YouTube website late last month that
mocked King Bhumibol, Thailand’s king for the past 60 years, who will turn 80 this year. Lese majeste is a crime in Thailand, punishable by imprisonment. Last month a provincial court sentenced a Swedish national to ten years in jail for defacing portraits of the king. Thailand has been under the joint rule of a junta and its appointed government
since October, 2006. The interim government has promised to step aside
after a general election promised in December, this year.

Thai Web crackdown blocks YouTube

By Thomas Fuller

Published: April 4, 2007

BANGKOK: Thailand’s military-appointed government
has blocked access to YouTube and several other Internet sites in a
crackdown on material that denigrates the country’s monarch, officials
said Wednesday.

“We have blocked YouTube because it contains a video insulting to
our king,” said Winai Yoosabai, head of the censorship unit at the
Ministry of Communication and Information Technology.

Thailand’s ban of the popular video-sharing Web site came after
YouTube’s owner, Google, refused to remove the video clip, the
communications minister, Sitthichai Pookaiyaudom, said.

The clip, crude and amateurish and lasting less than a minute,
depicts the king with a pair of feet being placed over his head, a
highly insulting gesture in Thailand.

Insulting King Bhumibol Adulyadej is a serious criminal offense.
Last week a Swiss man convicted of vandalizing images of the king and
Queen Sirikit was sentenced to 10 years in prison.

Since the military government came to power with the overthrow last
September of Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, it has banned Web
sites, instructed the news media to minimize reporting about Thaksin
and has at times blacked out broadcasts of international news channels
like CNN and the BBC. Reporting in newspapers remains lively and
apparently uncensored, except for criticism of the monarchy.

Sitthichai told The Associated Press that the government will
continue its crackdown. “It’s not about freedom of expression,” he
said. People who create Web sites insulting the monarchy “are abusing
their rights and clearly don’t mean well for the country.”

But the government also appears to have broadened its crackdown to
sites critical of the September coup, including www.saturdayvoice.com,
run by a group demanding that coup leaders transfer power to a
democratically elected government.

For the technologically savvy in Thailand, accessing YouTube is still possible.

Users could bypass the ban by calling a dial-up number in a foreign
country or using “anonymizer” Web sites that mask the underlying codes
of the censored Web sites, said David Bicknell, a Bangkok-based
telecommunications consultant.

Google, which is based in California, did not immediately respond to e-mail queries for comment.

Pornnapa Wongakanit contributed reporting from Bangkok.

Thailand blocks YouTube over mocking video

By Amy Kazmin in Bangkok and Shawn Donnan in Hong Kong

Published: April 4 2007 07:40 | Last updated: April 4 2007 07:40

Thailand’s military-installed government has blocked the popular website YouTube over a provocative video that mocks revered King Bhumibol Adulyadej,
amid rising political tensions over the role of the monarchy in September’s military coup.

The government’s move to block the site late Tuesday night comes amid a rapid rise in the number of blocked websites in Thailand, as the military struggles to prevent Thaksin Shinawatra, the marketing and technology-savvy exiled former
prime minister, from using the internet to reach out to his supporters,
and remain in the public eye

The move also comes at a time of mounting public controversy over the alleged role of Gen Prem Tinsulanonda, chairman of King Bhumibol’s Privy Council, in fomenting the coup that ousted Mr Thaksin.

In recent weeks, anti-coup political groups have circulated an unprecedented petition, calling on the king to remove Gen Prem, who is widely believed to have encouraged the military to move against Mr Thaksin – a belief that repeated denials by Gen Sonthi Boonyaratkalin, the army chief, have done little to dispel.

Thailand’s strict lese-majeste laws – which make it a serious crime to say
anything deemed offensive to the prestige of the royal family –
normally deters any open or critical discussion about the role, and
actions, of the monarchy in Thai political life.

But analysts say the common perception of Gen Prem’s deep involvement in the coup – and the suspicion that it also had the King’s blessing – has emboldened
some angry Thais to challenge the long-held taboo, which is normally
enforced with the threat of lengthy prison sentences.

The YouTube video that almost certainly prompted authorities to block the site
features a slide show of pictures of the king defaced with crudely
drawn electronic graffiti, with the images set to tinny martial music.

It is rare on the site in that most of the videos posted about the king
feature reverent images or benign footage of ceremonies marking either
his 60th anniversary in power or his recent 79th birthday.

The video, which has been viewed more than 6,000 times since it was posted
on March 29 by a user called “Paddidda,” a seemingly Thai-sounding, but
actually nonsensical name, has also drawn a vitriolic response from
some angry Thai users, who have demanded it be pulled off the site.

“We love our King and I know that you’ll never understand something like
this because you don’t have King in your country and you have never met
the one who could give anything for his people,” one user said in a
comment posted Wednesday. “So just shut the f*** up, if you don’t know
the damn thing.”

But it has also prompted a debate about free speech. “Please Thais on this board, stop acting like fundamentalist shouting ‘Allah Akbar!’” one user wrote Wednesday. “We are not that, use your brain. Ranting will only hurt Thai people on the whole! I know it’s not appropriate and all but would you please calm down?”

The same user said the image was likely posted by “a Thai who’s been a bit drunk on free speech and what not.”

Another user said: “The king is like our father, but that much is said by so
many people. I never think he is an untouchable god, but he is loved
and respected. If anyone does this to pictures of your parents, you
certainly won’t be happy about it, right?”

Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2007

FACT – Freedom Against Censorship Thailand

YouTube ถูกไอซีทีบล็อก (อีกแล้ว)

เว็บไซต์บริการรับฝากคลิปวีดิโอชื่อดัง YouTube
ถูกกระทรวงเทคโนโลยีสารสนเทศและการสื่อสาร (กระทรวงไอซีที)
บล็อกอีกครั้งหนึ่ง เมื่อคืนวันที่ 3 เมษายน พ.ศ. 2550
โดยทุกการเรียกดูไปยังที่อยู่เว็บ http://youtube.com จะถูกโอนไปยังหน้าเว็บของกระทรวงไอซีทีที่ http://w3.mict.go.th/ci/blocked.html โดยในหน้าดังกล่าวมีข้อความแจ้งว่า:

ขออภัย

เว็บไซต์นี้เป็นเว็บไซต์ที่ไม่เหมาะสม

กระทรวงเทคโนโลยีสารสนเทศและการสื่อสาร

โดยได้รับความร่วมมือจากผู้ให้บริการอินเทอร์เน็ต

และบริษัท กสท โทรคมนาคม จำกัด (มหาชน)

จำเป็นต้องปิดกั้นเว็บไซต์นี้

หากมีข้อคิดเห็นอื่นใด หรือพบเว็บไซต์อื่นที่ไม่เหมาะสม

โปรดแจ้งผ่านดวงตาข้างบนหรือ

ict.cyberclean.org

( Sorry! the web site you are accessing has been blocked by ministry of information and communication technology )

ขณะนี้ยังไม่มีการชี้แจงใด ๆ จากกระทรวงไอซีที ถึงสาเหตุการบล็อกในครั้งนี้

ครั้งก่อนหน้านี้

19 Responses to “YouTube ถูกไอซีทีบล็อก (อีกแล้ว)”

Thailand blocks YouTube for clip mocking king

Google declined government’s requests to withdraw video

Updated: 9:43 a.m. ET April 4, 2007

BANGKOK- Thailand’s military-appointed government blocked access to on-line
video-sharing Web site YouTube on Wednesday after its owner, Google
Inc., declined to withdraw a video clip mocking the country’s revered
monarch.

Communications Minister Sitthichai Pookaiyaudom told Reuters he had ordered a block of the entire site, www.youtube.com, from Thailand after the ministry’s
attempts to get the offending page removed last week failed.

“Since Google has rejected our repeated requests to withdraw the clip, we
can’t help blocking the entire site in Thailand,” said Sitthichai, a
professor who said he had spent most of his academic life researching
eavesdropping devices.

“When they decide to withdraw the clip, we will withdraw the ban,” he said.

YouTube, which has dominated the user-generated on-line video market since it
was founded in February last year, carried a 44-second clip ridiculing
King Bhumibol Adulyadej, the world’s longest reigning monarch, who is
revered by all 63 million Thais.

The sender of the clip, seen more than 16,000 times, was named “paddidda”
and has been rudely attacked by most of 99 comments, according to the
Web site.

“The king is the most revered figure in the country; he is untouchable,”
said Metha Sakaowrat, president of the Information Technology Press
Club — a guild of Thai IT journalists.

Sitthichai said YouTube had told Thai officials it did not find the clip offensive so turned down the request to remove it.

Woman’s feet

Officials at YouTube or Google, which paid $1.65 billion last year for the
video-sharing site, were not available for immediate comment on the
clip, a series of altered images of the King.

The most offensive to Thai Buddhists was the juxtaposition of a pair of
woman’s feet, the lowest part of the body, above his head, the highest
part of the body.

The blackout is the latest move by the generals who ousted Prime Minister
Thaksin Shinawatra in a bloodless coup last year against Web sites
deemed offensive to either the monarch or the army, or pro-Thaksin.

One site blocked last week was running a signature campaign against the
king’s top adviser, General Prem Tinsulanonda, whom anti-coup activists
accuse of agitating for the putsch against Thaksin.

The coup leaders and the appointed government deny muzzling free speech.

Criticizing or offending royalty is a crime in Thailand. Those guilty of ‘lese majeste’ can be jailed for up to 15 years.

Thailand blocks access to website after royal insult

dpa German Press Agency Published: Wednesday April 4, 2007

Bangkok- Thailand’s military installed government on

Wednesday blocked a popular website that has been featuring a mocking

video on the country’s revered King Bhumibol Adulyadej.

Efforts to access to the YouTube website were diverted to a

Ministry of Information website instead.

The blockage followed Information and Communications Technology

Minister Sitthichai Pookaiyaudom’s order to shut down any websites

deemed to be violating the orders issued by the leaders of the

September 19 coup d’etat that ousted former prime minister Thaksin

Shinawatra.

Sitthichai said the ministry had the authority to block any

websites considered to have committed lese majeste or seen as a

threat to national security.

A video clip was posted on the YouTube website late last month

that mocked King Bhumibol, Thailand’s king for the past 60 years, who

will turn 80 this year.

Lese majeste is a crime in Thailand, punishable by imprisonment.

Last month a provincial court sentenced a Swedish national to ten

years in jail for defacing portraits of the king.

Thailand has been under the joint rule of a junta and its

appointed government since October, 2006. The interim government has

promised to step aside after a general election promised in December,

this year.

WEDNESDAY, APRIL 04, 2007
9:32 MECCA TIME, 6:32 GMT

Thai crackdown on websites

Insulting King Bhumibol Adulyadej is a punishable offence in Thailand  [AP] Thailand’s military-installed government has shut down many websites and blocked access to online video-sharing website YouTube for mocking the country’s monarch.   It’s not about freedom of expression,” Sitthichai Pookaiyaudom, the minister of information and technology, said of the crackdown. bodyVariable350=”Htmlphcontrol1_lblError”; “People who create these [websites] are abusing their rights and clearly don’t mean well for the country.   “We have closed many and will continue to.” bodyVariable300=”Htmlphcontrol2_lblError”; Access to YouTube was blocked on Wednesday after its owner, Google, declined to withdraw a video clip mocking the king.   “Since Google has rejected our repeated requests to withdraw the clip, we can’t help blocking the entire site in Thailand,” Sitthichai said.   “When they decide to withdraw the clip, we will withdraw the ban.”   YouTube, which has dominated the user-generated online video market since it was founded in February last year, carried a 44-second clip ridiculing King Bhumibol Adulyadej, the world’s longest reigning monarch revered by all 63 million Thais.     The most offensive part of the clip, viewed more than 16,000 times, was the juxtaposition of a pair of woman’s feet, the lowest part of the body to Thai Buddhists, above the monarch’s head, the highest part of the body.   ‘Censorship’   Critics have accused the current government of shutting websites criticising the September coup that overthrew the government of Thaksin Shinawatra.   However, Sitthichai said the government is targeting only sites deemed insulting to the monarchy – a criminal offence in Thailand.   The government is also targeting pornographic sites, he said.   One of the sites shut down was launched by an anti-coup group, which calls itself Saturday Voice Against Dictators and has been holding protests demanding that coup leaders transfer power to a democratically elected government.   The group has also accused Prem Tinsulanonda, the king’s chief adviser, of playing a role in the coup.   Sitthichai said online remarks considered insulting to the king’s advisers would also result in a website being closed.

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