YouTube Complains to Turkish Constitutional Court over Renewed Ban

Video-sharing platform YouTube filed on Monday a complaint with the Turkish Constitutional Court against the blocking of its services which the country reinstated over the weekend.

Access to the website has been blocked for a second consecutive day, after a ban preventing its use in Turkey was lifter on April 4 and revised on April 5, The World Bulletin has reported.

Turkey's Telecommunications Authority blocked YouTube on March 27 short after leaked recordings of a security meeting involving ideas of intervention in Syria appeared on the website.

Magistrates took the decision amid threats by Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan to "wipe out" social media, which the ruling party considers dangerous to national security and on which a series of wiretapped conversations involving high-ranking Turkish officials have appeared since December, allegedly proving their role in corruption schemes.

The ban was at first lifted on April 4, but the court then ruled that 14 videos with an "illegal content" are to be removed.

Golbasi Criminal Court of First Instance stated the next day that authorities must reverse the measure, as the dangerous videos have not been removed.

Turkey's Telecommunications Authority earlier blocked Twitter, but the decision was overturned following international outcry. Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu played down claims that a violation of people's freedoms had been committed by re-introducing the ban.

"The Twitter ban is related to privacy, while the ban on YouTube is a matter of national security. It should not be perceived as a restriction of freedoms," Hurriyet Daily News quoted him as saying.