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Photo: DPA

China blocks Berlin Wall anniversary Twitter site

Published: 30 Oct 09 11:35 CET
Online: http://www.thelocal.de/society/20091030-22927.html

China’s government has blocked its citizens from logging onto a German website celebrating the fall of the Berlin Wall because Chinese bloggers were using it to voice civil rights concerns in their own country, the site announced on Thursday.

The Berlin Twitter Wall site was blocked in China on Monday afternoon Beijing time, according to the KulturProjekte Berlin, the non-profit arts organisation running the site.

Because it uses the micro-blogging site Twitter, users in China can still post comments, but their fellow Chinese internet users cannot read them.

“When we launched it on October 20, we got a lot of worldwide attention, so naturally Chinese people have seen it as a way to voice their opinions about internet censorship in their own country,” Carsten Hein, the project co-ordinator for the site, told The Local.

The site asks users to voice their thoughts on “which walls in the rest of the world should in their opinion now fall.”

Part of the Berlin government’s official celebrations for the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall, the site has been bombarded with comments in Chinese, Hein said.

The fall of the Berlin Wall has long been a sensitive issue in China, as it came just a few months after the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre, in which the Chinese army killed several hundred pro-democracy protesters.

The Local (news@thelocal.de)

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Your comments about this article:

12:38 October 30, 2009 by derExDeutsche
well, its a good thing Germany doesn't block ANY content on the Internet. Now, it can focus its attention and on others.

Its like the Alcoholic that says, 'well, I don't drink as much as Hans does.'
14:32 October 30, 2009 by Psychoid
@derExDeutsche

Germany still doesn't block any content from foreign countries. They planned it, but actually the protests might have achieved something.
14:50 October 30, 2009 by danyang
yes, it's the reason, protesting is legal in German. In China they will incarcerate them, beat them, or shoot them, and announce they are dangerous for country so that of they deserve having no human rights.
17:33 October 30, 2009 by mixxim
It is so good to hear of free speech in Germany, however there might be some (Irving) who disagree.
20:18 October 30, 2009 by Psychoid
Unfortunately there is no free speech in Germany. It's "freedom of opinion" here, which is more restricted. And claiming that none of the Nazis knew about the holocaust etc. is not seen as an opinion in Germany.

But it's a stupid idea to ban free speech. Without those laws no one would give a damn about Irving. Those laws made him famous. He's simply a successful troll.
20:43 October 30, 2009 by wxman
I like the picture on the Wall as the lead to this article. Breshnev and Honicker in a passionate open-mouth kiss. Typical socialist behavior. Breshnev even has his eyes closed, oh my!
03:48 October 31, 2009 by Devtc33
Capitalist Communism. I never thought in my life the 2 words would be combined but the empire of ancient China is reborn. The worse part I understand that a country with a recent history of revolution has a reason to fear it's own populace if you are the one in power. Sooner or later that control is going to be lost and when it does I fear those consequences.
06:52 October 31, 2009 by freechoice
This country is undergoing transformation, things were not allowed in the past is slowy opening up! Peaceful assemblies to demand for workers right are under the eyes of the police. Still many of such activities were not widely reported in the media. It still controlling public opinions through the media and influencing them on the Internet. A country whose primarily infatuated with technological advances and economic development will only leads to a nation without souls.

Their painful history of being bullied by 'foreigners' and carving up of their terrorities during the Manchu dynasty and Japanese during ww2 still remained the driving force behind their motivation for development and excuse for the regime to perpetuate their power with claims of foreign interventions.
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