Europe News

YouTube reposts videos that led to 30-month Turkish ban

Nov 2, 2010, 12:37 GMT

Istanbul - The online video sharing service YouTube has reposted material that led to the service being banned in Turkey for 30 months, a company spokesperson said Tuesday.

The block was initially put in place in May 2008 after a Turkish court ruled the videos insulted the memory of Mustapha Kemal Ataturk, modern Turkey's founder.

The service was restored in Turkey on Sunday when YouTube took the offending material down after a German company claimed the video violated its copyright.

But after analyzing the company's claim, Google, which owns YouTube, decided to repost the material.

'YouTube found that the videos did not violate the German company's copyright and uploaded them, although they are not accessible in Turkey,' Ozlem Oz, a spokeswoman for Grayling Public Relations, which represents Google in Turkey, told DPA.

The offending videos were previously not accessible in Turkey, but the Turkish court that blocked access to YouTube had asked for a global block on them.

The YouTube ban has become something of a black eye for Turkey, frequently cited by those who question the country's track record on freedom of expression. Both the European Union and the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) have expressed concern about the ban.

Turkey's internet law gives both the courts and the government broad powers to block access to websites.

Yaman Akdeniz, a professor of law at Istnbul's Bilgi University and an expert on Turkish internet law, said the reposting of the material would likely lead to a new ban.

'We are back to square one, basically,' he said.

Read more about Internet

Read more about Turkey Media