Tuesday, March 28, 2006

Pakistani bloggers blocked on blogspot.com


Sign the petition against the Pakistan government’s decision to censor blog sites.

This has been going on sometime and I missed it (Hat tip Renegade Eye). Pakistani bloggers using the same site as this one have been unable to read their blogs after all blogspot.com blogs were blocked. Apparently, internet sites on blogspot were inviting people to draw a cartoon of Mohammed (snigger, titter, titter..!). Pakistan authorities got scared at the protests in Karachi and other cities over the Danish cartoons fuss and blocked blogspot.

Unfortunately...there seems to be little fuss about the blockade on blogs in Pakistan. The BBC reports:

The BBC's Aamer Ahmed Khan in Karachi says the blocking is unlikely to turn into a major freedom of expression issue in Pakistan as there seems to be a consensus against allowing such freedom to extend to irreverent treatment of religious figures.

Oh, bugger.

But I still think it’s outrageous. It means the beatroot is banned in Pakistan! My many Pakistani readers must be extremely distressed.

Bring the beatroot back into Pakistan! Sign the petition now!

9 comments:

Lynn said...

Signed. Thanks for the link.

Arsenal did well today. We had the Barca game though.

sonia said...

Signed.

It really is medieval. But, truth be told, I don't recall ever having a visitor from Pakistan. My site meter shows many visitors from Iran and Malaysia, but not a single one from Pakistan...

beatroot said...

Arsenal did brilliantly! Juventus were crap.

If truth be told, the beatroot is not one of the top blogs in Pakistan. But Sonia, I think the Pakistani authorities and mullahs would just looove your site!

roman said...

My blog mates in Pakistan had to re-deploy using other services. Its a little bit of a nuisance but not a total disaster. Work-arounds are possible.
Originally, I thought that this was just a temporary measure to "cool down" the masses and therefore fulfilling the government's duty to safeguard their citizens from rioting, etc.
Now, though, because of the lack of serious opposition, the govt security service sees no need to open Blogger again and is making this a permanent injunction.

beatroot said...
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
beatroot said...

I agree...I think

Becca said...

Signed. Ridiculous.

Anonymous said...

So put up the Don't Block the Blogs banner, so that the bloggers know you are with them!!

http://help-pakistan.com/main/dont-block-the-blog/

beatroot said...

Do I have to?