Simply Pleasure.com
Award Winning Licensed Stores
vibrators, sex toys & lingerie
www.simplypleasure.com

Censorship News...
  2010
 

Search Thai-Anxiety

Thai Anxiety home page

Home Nightlife Index Nightlife News Bars: North Bars: Naklua News: Thailand Thai Life
Site Map News Index GoGos: North Soi 6 East Pattaya Scams
Links Thai Life Index GoGos: Walking St Soi 7/8 Central Censorship Diary
Exchange   GoGos: South Soi 13s South Farangland Sex Aware
Reviews    Massage Walking St Jomtien Adult World  

 

27th February    Clearing the Airwaves...
 
Thai Radio stations had been warned in the run up to Thaksin asset seizure case

Permalink

National Telecommunications CommissionThailand's National Telecommunications Commission had been investigating about 20 community radio stations for allegedly trying to incite violence in the run up to Thaksin's asset forfeiture verdict.

NTC acting secretary-general Thakorn Boonyasith said the stations were accused of violating operating regulations.

Some have been accused of encouraging listeners to cause chaos as the ruling on ousted prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra's 76.6-billion-baht asset seizure trial draws near. Others are alleged to have offended the monarchy.

The NTC says there are about 6,600 registered community radio stations across the country which are granted 300-day permits. They are prohibited from slandering anyone, inciting violence or damaging the institution of the monarchy. Those who do will have their permits revoked for a year. Thakorn said the stations in question had been asked to send their archived broadcasts for the past 30 days to the NTC for examination.

Thakorn said he had sent a letter to all community radio stations last week warning them to comply strictly with the regulations.

 

2nd January    Arresting Statistics...
 
Reporters Without Borders report on international arrests of bloggers

Permalink

Reporters without Borders logoReporters Without Borders has released its 2009 year-end round-up on. There are 151 bloggers and cyber-dissidents arrested, 61 physically assaulted and one died in prison in 2009. When compared with 2008, the number of bloggers arrested increased 155%. The report pointed out that China continued to be the leading internet censor in 2009 and RSF will launch a new campaign against the enemy of the Internet in coming March. Below is the summary on blogger and cyber dissidents section:

For the first time since the Internet's emergence, Reporters Without Borders is aware of more than 100 bloggers and cyber-dissidents being imprisoned worldwide for posting their opinions online. This figure is indicative above all of the scale of the crackdown being carried out in around ten countries. Several countries have turned online expression into a criminal offence, dashing hopes of a censorship-free Internet.

The Internet has been the driving force for pro-democracy campaigns in Iran, China and elsewhere. It is above all for this reason that authoritarian governments have shown themselves so determined to severely punish Internet users. This is the case with two Azerbaijani bloggers, who were sentenced to two years in prison for making a film mocking the political elite.

Although China continued to be the leading Internet censor in 2009, Iran, Tunisia, Thailand, Saudi Arabia, Vietnam and Uzbekistan have also resorted to frequent blocking of websites and blogs and surveillance of online expression. The Turkmen Internet remains under total state control.

This year, bloggers and ordinary citizens expressing themselves online have been assaulted, threatened or arrested as the popularity of social-networking and interactive websites has soared. Egyptian blogger Kareem Amer is still in jail, while the famous Burmese comedian Zarganar still has 34 years of his prison sentence to serve. The approximately 120 victims of Internet policing also include such leading figures in the defence of online free expression as China's Hu Jia and Liu Xiaobo and Vietnam's Nguyen Trung and Dieu Cay.

The financial crisis has joined the list of subjects likely to provoke censorship, particularly online. In South Korea, a blogger was wrongfully detained for commenting on the country's disastrous economic situation. Around six netizens in Thailand were arrested or harassed just for making a connection between the king's health and a fall in the Bangkok stock exchange. Censorship was slapped on the media in Dubai when it came for them to report on the country's debt repayment problems.

Democratic countries have not lagged far behind. Several European countries are working on new steps to control the Internet in the name of the battle against child porn and illegal downloads. Australia has said it will set up a compulsory filtering system that poses a threat to freedom of expression.

Turkey's courts have increased the number of websites, including YouTube, that are blocked for criticising the republic's founder, Mustafa Kemal Ataturk.

The number of countries affected by online censorship has doubled from one year to the next – a disturbing tendency that shows an increase in control over new media as millions of netizens get active online, said Lucie Morillon, head of the Internet and Freedoms Desk. That is why Reporters Without Borders will launch a new campaign against the Enemies of the Internet on 12 March.

 

17th January    A Thorn is the Side of the Censor...
   
Author sues Thai book censors

Almost a Century of Thorn-filled Thai Democracy bookWell-known Thai social critic Sulak Sivaraksa, author of the banned book Almost a Century of Thorn-filled Thai Democracy, will lodge a court case against the Special Branch Police Commander and the Interior Minister at the Central Administrative Court on Jan 16.

Sulak wants the court to lift the Special Branch Commander's order prohibiting sales and distribution, and confiscating copies of his book that was published in April 2007.

On Oct 1, 2007, Pol Maj Gen Sombat Suphajiva acting as printing authority issued Order 5/2007 banning Sulak's book that criticizes Thailand's democracy, alleging that the material may cause unrest and degrade good morals in Thai society. Copies of the book have been confiscated by the police since.

Sulak appealed to Interior Minister Gen Surayud Chulanont on Oct 8, 2007, and never received a response. So he decided to ask the Administrative Court to lift the ban order and have the defendants pay him damages of 1,094,000 baht with an annual interest rate of 7.5% starting from the date of prosecution.

Sulak said that the Special Branch Police had illegitimately and unlawfully issued the order to ban and confiscate his book without presenting any reasons and facts to prove what part in the book ‘may cause unrest and degrade public good morals', and had failed to grant him a chance to defend his book.

 

8th January    The Police Are Listening...
   
Into your internet connections

Thai police logoThe Royal Thai Police Department has asked the Telephone Organization of Thailand (TOT) to allow it to monitor the phone numbers of people logging on to the Internet.

The Department wants TOT to provide it with caller ID features for all local phone numbers dialing into the Internet, including the Internet users' log-in names.

The Department says the purpose of this request is "to protect against any crimes that may occur on the network" and acknowledges that the plan would mean that all Internet access in Thailand would monitored by the police.

 

6th January    Good Grief!...
   
Thai website taken down after comments about death of princess

sameskybooks screen shotThanapol Eiwsakul, editor of the Fah Diew Kan political magazine website sameskybooks.org, told The Nation yesterday it was no longer accessible. Other websites hosted on the same server were also offline as collateral damage.

It was like shutting down a printing house that prints a magazine. This is the price we're paying, said Thanapol, who insisted he always cooperated with the authorities and deleted material considered offensive to the monarchy.

He believed the posting of critical remarks following the death of Her Royal Highness Princess Galyani Vadhana might have led to the shutting down of the site by the Information and Communications Technology Ministry. Some visitors to the site posted critical remarks to the effect that the news media generalised when it said the whole country was in grief following the death of the Princess. One correspondent expressed refusal to follow the mourning dress code.

The ministry sent Thanapol an e-mail explaining the site had been shut as a result of offensive content. Thanapol said he had received no warning from the ministry.

Thanapol said he was considering legal action against the ministry and the host company, Internet Service.

 


 

News Index

 Thai News 2008: Jan-March April-June July-Sep Oct-Dec
 Thai News 2009: Jan-March April-June July-Sep Oct-Dec
 Thai News 2010: Jan-March
 Censorship News: 2008 2009 2010
 Farangland News 2008: Jan-March April-June July-Sep Oct-Dec
 Farangland News 2009: Jan-March April-June July-Sept Oct-Dec
 Farangland News 2010: Jan-March
 P4P News 2009: Jan-March April-June July-Sep Oct-Dec
 Adult World News 2010: Jan-March
 Pattaya News: 2008 2009 2010
 Computer Crime Act 2007 A translation of the law
 Ministry of Censorial Culture Thailand's Censors
 Links to offsite articles

Thai Anxiety home page

Home Nightlife Index Nightlife News Bars: North Bars: Naklua News: Thailand Thai Life
Site Map News Index GoGos: North Soi 6 East Pattaya Scams
Links Thai Life Index GoGos: Walking St Soi 7/8 Central Censorship Diary
Exchange   GoGos: South Soi 13s South Farangland Sex Aware
Reviews    Massage Walking St Jomtien Adult World