In latest developments, officials have detained several staff and web technicians in indepedent companies who have served or helped the previousely banned reformist websites, Emrooz and Rooydad, in order to gain access to the hosting accounts that were used to serve those websites. They have apparently siezed control of the servers, have shut them down and have deleted all the information on them.
Reza Khatami, chief of the major reformist party, Jebhe-ye Mosharekat, has protested to the new wave of pressure in a public letter to the vice-president, Mohammad Ali Abtahi, who is in charge of the legal and parliamentary relations and also has a popular website himself. The letter now appears on one of the remaining addresses, Rooydad.com, which is not under control of the agents.
Frustrating news is that no news agency or paper has reported on this in English. However, among the reliable Persian sources, BBC Persian and Reporters sans frontieres has covered it.
Posted at August 23, 2004 08:03 AM | TrackBack