{"id":4652,"date":"2023-02-26T13:28:24","date_gmt":"2023-02-26T13:28:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.saperspectives.net\/?p=4652"},"modified":"2023-02-26T13:28:24","modified_gmt":"2023-02-26T13:28:24","slug":"bangladesh-free-speech-advocates-worried","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.saperspectives.net\/old\/bangladesh-free-speech-advocates-worried\/","title":{"rendered":"Bangladesh: Free Speech advocates worried"},"content":{"rendered":"[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]\n<div style=\"line-height: 25px;\" align=\"justify\">Free Speech campaigners expressed concerns as the Bangladesh government ordered the shutdown of at least 191 websites it accuses of publishing \u201canti-state news.\u201d<\/div>\n<div style=\"line-height: 25px;\" align=\"justify\">Information Minister Hasan Mahmud told the country\u2019s parliament in late-January that the government has instructed the telecoms regulator to close the domains following \u201creports from intelligence agencies.\u201d<\/div>\n<div style=\"line-height: 25px;\" align=\"justify\">The Sheikh Hasina government has long been accused of silencing its critics and clamping down on the media. The draconian Digital Security Act, under which hundreds of people have been arrested since 2018, has caused particular alarm.<\/div>\n<div style=\"line-height: 25px;\" align=\"justify\">\u201cThe move to block news sites will hamper freedom of expression in the country. It will pave the way of spreading misinformation and disinformation\u201d, said Faruq Faisel, regional director of media rights watchdog ARTICLE 19 South Asia.<\/div>\n<div style=\"line-height: 25px;\" align=\"justify\">When asked about the government\u2019s decision, Stephane Dujarric, a spokesman for the United Nations secretary general, said, \u201cjournalists have a right to be able to operate their news sites freely and openly, and we want to see positive movement in that direction.\u201d<\/div>\n<div style=\"line-height: 25px;\" align=\"justify\">\n<p>The US Ambassador Peter Haas in Dhaka said, \u201cwe are concerned about the announcement that 191 online news portals will be blocked. The ability to accept criticism and ensure freedom of speech even when that speech is unpleasant are hallmarks of a strong democracy.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n[\/vc_column_text][vc_empty_space][\/vc_column][\/vc_row]\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text] Free Speech campaigners expressed concerns as the Bangladesh government ordered the shutdown of at least 191 websites it accuses of publishing \u201canti-state news.\u201d Information Minister Hasan Mahmud told the country\u2019s parliament in late-January that the government has instructed the telecoms regulator to close the domains following \u201creports from intelligence agencies.\u201d The Sheikh Hasina government&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4653,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[238],"tags":[],"thb-sponsors":[],"class_list":["post-4652","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-south-asia-perspectives"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saperspectives.net\/old\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4652","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saperspectives.net\/old\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saperspectives.net\/old\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saperspectives.net\/old\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saperspectives.net\/old\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4652"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.saperspectives.net\/old\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4652\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4654,"href":"https:\/\/www.saperspectives.net\/old\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4652\/revisions\/4654"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saperspectives.net\/old\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4653"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saperspectives.net\/old\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4652"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saperspectives.net\/old\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4652"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saperspectives.net\/old\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4652"},{"taxonomy":"thb-sponsors","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saperspectives.net\/old\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/thb-sponsors?post=4652"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}