DUSHANBE, January 31, 2013, Asia-Plus — A decision on restricting access to some Internet websites is made only incompliance with the country’s civil code, Rafiqjon Shokirov, the deputy head of the Communications Service under the Government of Tajikistan, told journalists on January 30.
According to him, the communications service agency has not given any instructions requesting websites to be blocked.
Shokirov suggested that the issue might have been caused by technical problems faced by the Internet service providers themselves.
He added that was no any blacklist of websites to be blocked in Tajikistan
Meanwhile, another representative of the communications service agency, Ms. Tatiana Kholmuorodova, noted that “as the communications and information regulatory agency, the government’s Communications Service has leverage to influence Internet service providers (ISPs).”
We will recall that the Facebook social network and RFE/RL”s website were inaccessible in Tajikistan for several days this month. Access to some sites via several Tajik ISPs remains difficult
Tajik authorities blocked Facebook and several online news sites in March and November 2012. The sites were later unblocked.
In the meantime, the communications service agency is in no hurry to fulfill an order of the Supreme Court to block website of a terrorist organization.
Official sites of Jamaat Ansarullah, Islamist group banned in Tajikistan as terrorist – www.irshod.com and www.irshod.net – are still available to visitors in Tajikistan. These websites should have been blocked in May 2012 following ruling handed down by the Supreme Court.
The Communications Service under the Government of Tajikistan was ordered to block the websites www.irshod.com and www.irshod.net, which are considered to be mouthpiece for Jamaat Ansarullah. However, the websites are still remains available to visitors in Tajikistan.
Jamaat Ansarullah became known in Tajikistan after the group claimed responsibility for a suicide bombing in the northern Tajik city of Khujand at the start of September 2010.
