Amidst coverage in the Swedish media and a protest by RSFYemenPortal.net blocked for fifth consecutive day [Archives:2008/1123/Front Page]

By: Yemen Times Staff
SANA'A, Jan. 23 ) Swedish daily Nerikes Allahanda gave significant coverage in its issue Wednesday on the blocking of YemenPortal.net, Yemen's first and only news search engine, essentially a product of a master study at rebro University in Sweden by Walid Al-Saqaf. The search engine, which tracks more than 200,000 items, gained significant popularity in Yemen and the world after it was established in May 2007. It was also approved by rebro University's Master of Arts in Global Journalism as a research tool used to study and analyze Yemeni online news media. Furthermore, Swedish radio's Arabic program, which reaches many Arab countries, broadcast a special program on this blockage and interviewed members of the academic cadre responsible for the program along with Al-Saqaf, who expressed his disappointment of the censorship and demanded the prompt unblocking of the website, which he said covers all political views and opinions related to Yemen.

Int'l advocacy group acts

This comes as Paris-based Reports sans Fronti'res (RSF) condemned the blockage of YemenPortal.net in a press release published the same day. “President Ali Abdullah Saleh's government is forced to deal with growing social unrest and a Zaidi uprising but that is no reason to target the media and websites,” RSF said. “As the government is unable to influence what the media posts, the government has decided to block independent news websites in order to suppress their criticism.” The blockage of YemenPortal.net along with several other websites with a political or opinion orientation was triggered, according to RSF, after Prime Minister Ali Mohammed Mujawar and other government officials accused the press on January 17 of “jeopardizing the country's national interest” and “inciting secession.”

Solidarity and resistance

To combat this wave of blockages, 28 representatives of the news and opinion websites came together under the auspices of YemenPortal.net in a meeting on Tuesday. In the meeting the websites condemned the blockage and asked President Saleh to intervene. In the final official statement of the assembly, the participants also denounced “violations that were and are still being committed against online news websites in the form of blockage, threats and other acts that contradict the democratic orientation of the country.”

Furthermore, they also agreed to approve and support an initiative by YemenPortal.net named 'Combating Website Blocking Initiative', through which the search engine will deliberately place the full material of blocked websites on its pages. Concerning the initiative, Al-Saqaf noted that “this action is a sort of resistance that will be carried out only if the government continues to insist on blocking any Yemeni web pages from access by visitors in Yemen. By exposing all the blocked material to any visitor to YemenPortal.net or its alternative links, we hope to demonstrate that in this era, blocking access to information is not only wrong, but it is impossible to sustain and is ultimately a waste of time and energy.”

The bold step was viewed by one official, whose name is kept anonymous to avoid repercussions, as a 'threat', hinting to the possibility that it could constitute a risk to Al-Saqaf and his search engine. “I'm fine with taking a risk if that is what it takes to ensure that visitors are able to access material hidden from them by the authorities. The people in Yemen need to know stories from both angles, and that is a fundamental right that the government should not take away from them,” Al-Saqaf said.

Online journalists want a role

The assembly on Tuesday focused on the need to have a more prominent role for online journalists. A four-member committee was formed to work on a mechanism to establish a unit in the Yemeni Journalists Syndicate YJS dediated solely to online journalism. Nabil Al-Sufi of newsyemen.net, Ms. Nabila Al-Hakimi of alhadath-yemen.net, Hassan Al-Zaidi of yemenpost.net, and Isam Al-Sufyani of almotamar.net will be working with the YJS to establish this unit and to allow membership for online journalists so they could be on par with their colleagues working in printed and broadcast media.
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