Global Voices Online

Morocco blocks access to YouTube

Saturday, May 26th, 2007 @ 19:05 UTC

by Sami Ben Gharbia

Countries:: Morocco
Topics:: Freedom of Speech, Politics

Yesterday, May 25, 2007, it has been reported by numerous Moroccan blogger that Morocco has blocked access to YouTube video sharing website. There have been many ongoing speculations that the ban followed the broadcasting of material critical of the country's king and pro-Western Sahara. This is the third major sites blocked by the Moroccan filtering regime after Google Earth and Livejournal.

17 comments

Pingback: Mideast Youth - Thinking Ahead » Blog Archive » Youtube blocked in Morocco

[...] Since yesterday Maroc Telecom has blocked all access to Youtube. The Moroccan blogosphere (blogoma) is totally surprised by the move and angered. There were no reasons given why Youtube was blocked. But the speculations are that it might have to do something with the presence of Polisario-clips (Polisario being the Western Sahara independence movement) or because of some videos that were criticized the king. [...]

# 2007-05-26 at 22:13 pm
Naim

Hi

Thanks for the mention of my blog but I need to correct some informations. First of all, Morocco didn’t block access to Youtube. It’s Maroc Telecom, the main telecom operator owned by Vivendi. The other telecom networks (Wana and Meditel) still have access to Youtube and Google Earth.

Have a nice day.

# 2007-05-27 at 0:45 am

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Pingback: Dis Moi! » Blog Archive » Coup de ciseaux au Maroc

[...] Lire ici , ici et ici. [...]

# 2007-05-27 at 1:32 am
Omar

I have just read the posting about Morocco blocking YouTube – living in Morocco I can state that it is not (blocked), I have been abele to log-on and view film clips without any problems what so ever.

# 2007-05-27 at 11:21 am

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Pingback: The Morocco Report » On free speech

[...] So props to The View From Fez, Youssef (here and here), Agora, Hchica, El Hafa, Larbi, Sami ben Gharbia at GVO, A Moroccan in Washington D.C. and anyone else who is making an effort to open a dialogue on this subject. [...]

# 2007-05-27 at 15:05 pm
Pingback: YouTube bloqueado en Marruecos -- PlooSolutions

[...] Se cree que el motivo principal es la aparición de vídeos del Frente Polisario en la página, además de varios vídeos en los que se criticaba al Rey. Maroc Telecom es la principal proveedor de internet del país, y también tiene bloqueado el acceso a Google Maps y a LiveJournal. [...]

# 2007-05-27 at 19:03 pm
Ad

The person who posted the news about Maroc Telecom blocking YouTube is nothing but an anti-Moroccan policy towards our Sahara. Besides, there are hundreds of ways to express any disagreements on anyhting online. YouTube is not special on this.

# 2007-05-27 at 22:40 pm

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Pingback: What exactly happened? at Stop the censorship

[...] Global Voices Online » Morocco blocks access to YouTube [...]

# 2007-05-27 at 23:45 pm
Pingback: Marruecos bloquea el acceso a YouTube | La brujula verde

[...] El pasado día 25 de mayo muchos bloguers marroquis reportaron el bloqueo que su gobierno estaba haciendo a YouTube. Dicho bloqueo se viene a sumar al de Google Earth y LiveJournal, y parece que tiene que ver con material crítico con el rey y a favor del Sáhara Occidental. [...]

# 2007-05-28 at 11:14 am
x

I confirm, we are not able to access youtube via Maroc Telecom, don’t know why they blocked the access…

# 2007-05-28 at 17:08 pm

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