French need to be spanked by Nazis, hard
John Doe #N
jd at armyofone.org
Mon Jun 25 11:33:39 PDT 2001
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/20010622/wr/internet_hate_dc_2.html
Friday June 22 1:32 PM ET
Group Seeks Injunction to Block
Racist Web Site
By Catherine Bremer
PARIS (Reuters) - A French anti-racism group is
asking for an injunction to block access to a neo-Nazi
U.S. Web portal, a move set to fuel a running debate
about Internet controls.
International Action for Justice (AIPJ), whose action
comes amid transatlantic wrangling over a separate
case against U.S. Internet service provider Yahoo!
over xenophobic sites, wants France cut off from the
U.S. ``Front14'' portal which acts as a free speech
space for racists.
Front 14's Web site, which carries the slogan ``online
hate at its best,'' offers domain hosting, web animation
and web marketing services for neo-Nazi
organizations wanting to get onto the Internet.
The site currently groups well over 400 racist Web
sites and has scores more under construction,
according to the AIPJ, which will seek the injunction
in a Paris court on June 29.
The debate pits those concerned about the proliferation
of extreme material on the Internet against proponents
of free speech and highlights the difficulties in
applying national censorship laws to the Web.
``We are asking these national ISPs to prevent access
to an address that is offering hosting and web services
for illegal, neo-Nazi militant Web sites,'' said AIPJ's
lawyer Stephane Lilti.
``We need to solve this problem. We cannot tolerate
our laws being flouted by this site which acts like an
incubator for nearly 500 neo-Nazi sites,'' he told
Reuters, noting that some of the sites in question are
based in France.
AIPJ wants General Communication Inc., a U.S. Web
site hosting company which carries front14.org, to be
banned from offering access to the Web site to
France-based Internet users.
It also wants French ISP association AFA, whose
members include all major French providers covering
87 percent of French Web users, to block access to the
site.
However, the AFA, which was not immediately
available for comment Friday, has told the AIPJ it will
not back its stand and argued that limiting access to
Front14 would infringe on privacy rights as it would
require controls on all Web users.
Chicago-based General Communication was also
unavailable for comment.
The case comes amid an ongoing spat over a French
lawsuit filed last year by barrister Charles Korman
which resulted in a Paris court ordering Yahoo! to
alter its American servers so that France-based Web
surfers could not access Nazi-related material on the
Internet. Yahoo! is still fighting the ruling.
The Council of Europe is drafting the world's first
treaty against cybercrime, a text due to be approved
this month which could become a global standard to
fight Internet crime.
But the treaty has come under fire for being vague and
Council deputies have expressed disappointment that
there is no specific provision to make it illegal to
spread racist propaganda and hate messages on the
Web.
``Incitation to racial hatred is a crime and everybody
knows that. And technically it is quite possible for
ISPs to blacklist certain Web sites,'' Lilti said.
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