Baku / 09.08.18 / Turan: The blocking of websites is unreasonable, and this in itself is a legal nonsense. This opinion was expressed by the head of the Azerbaijan Journalists Union, editor-in-chief of the Ayna.az website Elchin Shikhly, commenting on Turan's request that the courts decided to block four news websites in the last two days.
"The reasons for this process are not clear, as are its objectives," Shikhly said.
However, one thing is clear: the process of "clearing the information space is going on, although it is difficult to say who and for what is doing it," he added.
In turn, MP Faraj Guliyev considers it permissible to block websites if they disseminate information to the detriment of the interests of the state, publish slander, or lie about officials.
At the same time, he believes it is not right to block websites only because of criticism.
"We have to write about the negatives that reign in society. Counteracting this means hindering the development of society," said the MP.
Recall that over the past two days, decisions of the courts on the proposal of the Electronic Security Center of the Ministry of Communications blocked the news websites az24saat.org, xural.com, arqument.az and monitortv.info.
The process of blocking websites began in the spring of 2017, when access to the Internet resources was blocked for Azadlig Radio, Meydan.TV, the Azadlig newspaper, Turan TV, and the Azerbaijan Hour TV program.
This happened after the introduction of amendments to the laws "On Information, Informatization and Information Protection" and "Telecommunications" by the Parliament on March 10, 2017.
To date, about 40 websites have already been blocked by court decisions. Almost all of them were oppositional. -05B06-
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