Pakistan on Thursday blocked the popular video sharing website YouTube in a bid to contain blasphemous material.
The blockade came hours after the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) directed Internet service providers to stop access to social network site Facebook i
ndefinitely on Wednesday because of an online competition to draw the Prophet Mohammed.
Any representation of the Prophet Mohammed is deemed un-Islamic and blasphemous by Muslims.
Wahajus Siraj, the CEO of Nayatel, an Internet service provider, said PTA issued an order late on Wednesday seeking an “immediate” blockade of YouTube.
“It was a serious instruction as they wanted us to do it quickly and let them know after that,” he said in a statement.
YouTube was also blocked in the Muslim country in 2007 for about a year for what it called un-Islamic videos. PTA spokesman, Mr Khurram Ali Mehran, said the action was taken after the authority determined that content considered blasphemous by devout Muslims was being posted on the website. “Before shutting down (YouTube), we did try just to block particular URLs or links, and access to 450 links on the Internet were stopped, but the blasphemous content kept appearing so we ordered a total shut down,” he said.
He regretted that the administrators at the Facebook and YouTube had not taken the content off despite Pakistan’s protests.
“Their attitude was in contravention to international resolutions and their own policies advertised on the Web for the general public,” Mr Mehran said.
The PTA decision to block all of Facebook also cut Pakistanis off from groups and pages dedicated to opposing the competition.