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The government of the world's most populous Islamic state says YouTube has two days to take down a Dutch lawmaker's provocative film on the Koran or it will block access to the popular video-sharing Web site.The warning by Indonesia came as the U.N.'s primary human rights watchdog ended a month-long session amid allegations by Western member-states and non-governmental organizations that Islamic nations are working to curtail free speech.Geert Wilder's 16-minute film linking Islam's revered text with terrorism has sparked protests in a number of countries. It also drew criticism from the Arab League, the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC) and the European Union.In Indonesia, a former Dutch colony, Information Minister Mohammad Nuh told a press briefing in Jakarta Tuesday he had sent a letter to YouTube demanding the film, "Fitna," be removed. If it did not comply, he said, the government in cooperation with Internet service providers would block the site.As of early Wednesday afternoon Indonesian time, attempts to view at least one earlier-available upload of the movie on YouTube brought up a message saying, "This video has been removed due to terms of use violation."But the film has been uploaded on YouTube by multiple users and can still be found with a simple search in both its English and Dutch versions.In response to queries, a YouTube spokesperson said the site allows people "to express themselves and to communicate with a global audience.""The diversity of the world in which we live -- spanning the vast dimensions of ethnicity, religion, nationality, language, political opinion, gender, and sexual orientation, to name a few -- means that some of the beliefs and views of some individuals may offend others," she said.Videos that breach YouTube guidelines are removed, and some graphic material is restricted if not suitable for all audiences, the spokesperson added.Wilders first uploaded Fitna late last week on a British video-sharing site, LiveLeak, where several million views were recorded before the company took it down, citing threats against its staff.LiveLeak later lifted the suspension, saying it had tightened security measures, only to have Wilders himself withdraw the film, saying he planned to edit it because of copyright infringement complaints, and would upload an amended version later.By then, however, the film - which includes a mix of images of terror attacks, verses from the Koran, and menacing quotes by radical clerics and others - was already available on numerous other sites on the Internet, including YouTube.In a third consecutive day of small-scale protests in Indonesia, Muslims demonstrated outside the Dutch Embassy in Jakarta on Tuesday, some of them calling for Wilders to be killed for insulting Islam, according to the official news agency Antara.President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, who has banned Wilders from entering the country, urged Indonesians to remain calm, but also said world leaders had a moral obligation to prevent religious or cultural defamation.The Dutch government has repeatedly distanced itself from the film, while noting that the country's constitution protects freedom of expression. It has posted statements to that effect on the Web sites of a number of its diplomatic missions, including the embassy in Jakarta.But Indonesia's Prosperous Justice Party (PKS), a party with strong Islamic credentials that supports Yudhoyono, said that unless the Netherlands apologizes to the world's Islamic countries, Muslims everywhere should boycott Dutch products (similar calls have been made in neighboring Malaysia and other Muslim countries.)To read more go to:
As in the days of Noah.....
