The site has been reported to be hosting a video named “Russia for Russians”, the video judged as an extremist by the jury of a court in Komsomolsk-on-Amur, Russia. The court’s ruling has also been imposed on to the Internet Archive and three other online libraries which were found to be hosting writings of Adolf Hitler.
As a follow on to these rulings in Russia many other governments have imposed some or the other kind of restrictions.
Some other online libraries named Lib.rus.ec, Thelib.ru and Zhurnal.ru, were also found hosting writings of Adolf Hitler. The court has also taken actions against the Internet Archive and three online libraries.
This is not the first time that You Tube has been banned by a government.A lot of countries including China, Brazil, Indonesia, Iran, Morocco, Pakistan, Tunisia, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Thailand and the United Arab Emirates hav banned You Tube at some point or the other. Russia is just the new entry in this long list. The material has been censored in countries like U.S and U.K.
Mostly, such sites are banned or censored by the government due to videos having objectionable content .Content which according to the Government is not intended to be seen by the citizens.
The name “Russia for Russians” is itself considered as a slogan of hatred which is used for the multi-ethnic society that exists in Russia today.
These actions may be taken by other democratic Government as a restriction to the freedom of speech despite the intensions behind the decision taken.
The owner of Rosnet, the ISP affected by today’s decision, is Aleksandr Ermakov. He said to the media “All of mankind is using this website. And providers like ours do not violate Russian law. But we are still being forced to close the website so that our users can not log on and watch the videos. This is absurd! According to this logic, we have to demolish all buildings that have swastikas on the walls. Or when two people are discussing a bomb over the phone, we have to take away the phones from all people across Russia.”
The site was banned after all the evidences were presented at the hearing.