Qatar accused of blocking popular English-language news website
A popular news website has become inaccessible in Qatar, with reports suggesting that authorities deliberately blocked it over articles it published earlier in the year.
The management team of Doha News, the most visited English-language website in Qatar, said Thursday that their site had been inaccessible to most users for almost 24 hours.
They said another domain name was created for the users but that, too, stopped working, prompting speculations that authorities were deliberately targeting the website.
“We are incredibly disappointed with this decision, which appears to be an act of censorship,” the website’s management said in a statement, adding, “We can only conclude that our website has been deliberately targeted and blocked by Qatar authorities.”
The decision to block Doha News, a website which claims to have an audience of around one million users per month, seems to be linked to two editorials carried by the site. In one of the editorials, the website alleged that Qatar’s cybercrime law was being used to “silence” people.
“We believe strongly in the importance of a free press, and are saddened that Qatar, home of the Doha Center for Media Freedom and Al-Jazeera, has decided to take this step,” added Doha News in its statement.
Reports said some users could still visit the site using a virtual private network (VPN) but access was generally blocked on mobiles and computers.
Qatar’s internet service providers, Ooredoo and Vodafone, have declined to comment on the issue.
A general censorship row could be an embarrassing case for Qatar, a country that claims to be an advocate of freedom of expression in the Arab world.
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