Asserting that it had blocked six websites for violating the country’s laws, ‘only temporarily’, the Media Ministry said yesterday that the owners of those websites could come and discuss the matter with the authorities and give their side of the story. “We are ready to discuss with them at any time and ready to cooperate with them if they genuinely want to adhere the country’s laws in the future,” said Media Ministry Secretary W.B. Ganegala, adding, “We blocked them for violating the country’s laws in a manner that amounted to character assassination and invasion of privacy.”

The Telecommunications Regulatory Commission blocked www.lankaenews.com, srilankamirror.com, srilankaguardian.com, paparacigossip9.com and www.lankawaynews.com on Saturday. On Saturday, the ministry requested all the websites carrying material related to Sri Lanka to register with the Media Ministry and appealed to them to adhere to media ethics and the Sri Lankan law.

“We decided to bring this in order to introduce the ethics for internet media, as we saw an increase of unethical types of internet media which even damaged the country’s image, individuals’ image etc.,” Mr. Ganegala said.

“Some of these websites had no owners, if we want to reply to some articles appearing on these websites, we don’t know whom to send them to,” he said.

He also warned that the government was monitoring almost all of the websites and would take action in the future, if those websites did not adhere the country’s laws. (SJ)

Source: Daily Mirror - Sri Lanka