In a first for protests, religious organisation slams website ban
A man tries to access social networking website Twitter in Pakistan. Twitter was banned by Pakistan Telecommunication Authority last month. Recently, a Shia watchdog website came under a similar ban and members of a Shia religious organisation protested the ban in Karachi. – File photo by AFP
KARACHI: In what was possibly the first protest of its kind, a religious organisation was met with aerial firing by the police in Karachi, when they gathered to demonstrate against the shutdown of a Shia watchdog website.
The Shia Action Committee was protesting the alleged ban of the website http://www.shiakilling.com, when they were stopped at downtown Karachi’s Numaish Chowrangi, DawnNews reported on Tuesday.
The protestors, who were reportedly in hundreds, set off from Shah-i-Khurasan area (Jamshed Town), chanting anti-government slogans on their way. When they reached Numaish Chowrangi, police tried to stop them, which led to an altercation between both parties. Police officials then resort to aerial firing. While the crowd dispersed to the nearby alleyways, some still managed to move past Numaish and continued with their agitation.
A website, which monitors and maintains a “death count” of Pakistani Shia Muslims targeted in sectarian violence, has been banned by the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority, which operates on the directives of the Ministry of Information. Upon attempting to access the website, users are met with a “Access denied” message, a usual occurrence for banned websites.
Pakistan has previously banned social networking websites including Facebook and Twitter for carrying content considered disrespectful towards Islam and the Holy Prophet (PBUH).
Any of you agreeing with the ban of this website, please take a moment and think about this……if you are seriously against sectarian division the first thing you should do is protest against these killing rather than agreeing with the ban. These innocent people are being killed because they are shia. Shouldn’t you be asking the killers (who openly admits that they are the killers) to stop killing innocent Muslims because of their sect.
If you take a stand that there should not be a single person killed or even hurt because of their sects and any one responsible for these crimes is NOT a Muslim, only then you are truly against sectarian division and we will all respect you.
It is sad to see that you were able to take time to write against a website which was only reporting the crimes but did not say a world against the killers…..is this just??
website bnd krna acha qadam ha .
AGREE WITH ZEHRA
Do you agree that shias are other than muslims and must be counted separetely