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Wednesday, 12 March 2008

YouTube is unblocked in Armenia

Armenia Election Monitor reports that after several days being blocked, YouTube is now accessible in Armenia. All videos of 1 March events appear to be accessible too (I assume this one too).

The legality of blocking Internet sites under the provisions of 'state of emergency' decree is very questionable. Still, independent and pro-opposition websites remain unaccessible.

It remains to be seen how (if) things will change when as promised today by president Kocharyan, restrictions on media will be partly lifted by tomorrow morning.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

To confirm, I just went to the page you link to with the video on your blog and could watch it. Would be very interesting to discover what the story is behind it now being accessible. For example, was pressure put on or whether they understood the block just created a worse image outside Armenia.

artmika said...

I hope it will be a lesson to current and future Armenian authorities that they may be 'successful' for a while with political persecutions inside the country, they may be 'successful' for a while with shutting down independent or pro-opposition local media, but they just can't fight Internet!

Anonymous said...

Hmmm, maybe I spoke too soon. It worked yesterday, but today it's back to how it was. Not accessible and timing out. I'm on a fast connection and will check again tonight from home.

Disappointing.

Anonymous said...

Ok, it appears as though the block has been removed by ArmenTel as I can access YouTube from home with no problems.

However, at an office using a connection provided by ADC, there appears to still be a block.

Hopefully they're just a little slow in allowing access again.

artmika said...

Will be interesting to see whether the access to internet sites is restored in full by tomorrow, when Kocharyan decree on partly lifting media restrictions come into effect.