(RSF/IFEX) – RSF has condemned the 7 October 2004 seizure of United Kingdom (UK)-based webservers used by some 20 Indymedia websites. The organisation has written to British Home Secretary David Blunkett, with copies to his United States (US), Italian and Swiss counterparts, seeking an explanation for the confiscations. The servers were seized from Rackspace, a […]
(RSF/IFEX) – RSF has condemned the 7 October 2004 seizure of United Kingdom (UK)-based webservers used by some 20 Indymedia websites. The organisation has written to British Home Secretary David Blunkett, with copies to his United States (US), Italian and Swiss counterparts, seeking an explanation for the confiscations.
The servers were seized from Rackspace, a US-owned web-hosting company that operates in the UK, at the request of the US Justice Department, which apparently acted at the prompting of Italian and Swiss authorities.
Indymedia is an international media network that operates without central editorial control and on which users can freely post their messages.
RSF condemned the seizures and called for the equipment to be returned. “This intervention is the responsibility of the British authorities because it relates to a hosting company operating on their territory. Closure of websites is a serious step, the reasons for which must be made public,” said RSF in its letter to Blunkett.
The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) apparently requested the seizures from the Texan-based Rackspace, which hosts Indymedia websites in the US and the UK. The company complied with a 7 October federal order, shutting down some 20 Indymedia sites including those in France, Yugoslavia, Belgium, Italy, Brazil, Portugal and the UK.
On 8 October, Ed Gibson, a legal officer at the US Embassy in London, strongly denied to RSF that the US federal police had played any part in the seizure. However, according to a statement by an FBI spokesman to Agence France-Presse (AFP), the bureau did order the seizure of the servers, but “on behalf of another country.” Swiss and Italian authorities were apparently behind the decision, even though they have made no official statement on the subject.
The US Justice Department issued the seizure order under the Mutual Legal Assistance Treaty (MLAT), which allows far-reaching police co-operation in the fields of international terrorism, kidnapping and money-laundering.
The Swiss authorities reportedly sought US intervention after some Indymedia sites posted photographs of two Geneva police officers in charge of identifying “rioters” who took part in demonstrations against the G8 summit. The alternative media was apparently also being targeted by the prosecutor’s office in Bologna, Italy, since messages were posted in November 2003 fiercely criticising Italian military involvement in Iraq.
