Media Leaders Condemn Illegal Blocking of Websites

Baku / 17.11.17 / Turan: The leaders of the recently blocked 14 websites of Azerbaijan consider the Public Policy Division of the Presidential Administration, the Press Council and the Media Development Support Fund to be the culprits of this. They told Turan about this.

"The reason for blocking the websites we run is the publication of critical articles about the above structures," Ikram Rahimov, editor-in-chief of the Realliq.info website, said.

According to him, this happened after urgent demands to remove materials from the Internet that were not suitable for the authorities. For the same reason, these websites were included in the "black list" of the Press Council, and then blocked by the Ministry of Communications.

Among the blocked websites there are realliq.info, realliq.az, NIA.az, neytral.az, politika.az, vediinfo.az, obyektiv.org, sonolay.org, 24saat.org, ulus.az, qanunxeber.az, infoaz.org, xalqinsesi.com, and aztoday.az.

Speaking about the mechanism of blocking, the editor noted that at first they were included in the "black list", and then the Press Council appealed to the Ministry of Communications.

The media leaders accused the Press Council of defending the interests of officials. "The Press Council for a long time protects not the interests of journalists, but those of officials, which in fact means giving up their mission. The Press Council has turned into a mechanism for punishing media structures and journalists," Rahimov said.

As a public structure, the Press Council applies to law enforcement agencies and seeks to punish the media and journalists. They represent the websites they disapprove as hostile to the leadership of the country, said Rahimov.

Heads of websites intend to address the head of state Ilham Aliyev with an appeal to intervene in the situation and put an end to the persecution of freedom of speech on the part of persons implementing state policy in the field of the media.

Website managers also intend to file a lawsuit against the Ministry of Communication for blocking websites without a court decision.

Recall that in April 2017, the Milli Mejlis adopted amendments to the laws On Information, Informatization and Protection of Information" and On Telecommunications, which control the activity of information Internet resources on top-level domains. Experts called the changes an attempt to "filter" the Internet.

In particular, the amendments oblige the hosting provider and the Internet provider in case of detection of prohibited information to notify the owner of the website and delete it. Otherwise, access to the resource will be limited in court, and the owners themselves and the hosting providers will be punished. The amendments say that within eight hours after the warning, the prohibited information must be deleted. In cases of threat to the interests of the state and society, protected by law, or in the event of a threat to life and health of people, access to this information on the Internet resource will be temporarily limited."

The amendments prohibit the dissemination by owners of Internet domains and websites of information representing state secrets, propagandizing violence and religious extremism, terrorism and its financing, calling for national, racial or religious hatred and enmity, as well as violent change of the constitutional order of the state.

It is prohibited to place information on the manufacture of firearms, ammunition, explosives, narcotic drugs and psychotropic substances, pornographic materials, as well as offensive and deceptive information, including those violating personal privacy.

The leaders of the closed websites claim that they did not violate the law and did not receive a notification in this connection.

Recall that in the spring of this year the Center for Electronic Security of the Ministry of Communications, Communications and High Technologies blocked Radio Azadlig, Meydan.TV, Turan.TV, azadliq.info, and the Azerbaijan Saaty program.

Then the court granted the blocking of the websites by its decision. -0-