On Wednesday, the Criminal Court lifted its order for the closure of online platforms of four media outlets and an anti-government movement, including VoiceTV, saying only illegal content should have been blocked.
On Monday the court granted a request by the Ministry of Digital Economy and Society (DES) to order the closure of a website operated by VoiceTV.
The DES obtained similar closure orders for Prachatai.com, The Reporters, The Standard and the Free Youth movement.
The requests concerned content relating to anti-government demonstrations.
The court said it had ordered the closure of 12 URLs, resulting in the closure of the communications channels of the five outlets but blamed the ministry for failing to clearly tell it that its request would result in the closure of the platforms.
The ministry’s presentation had been inaccurate and the court had not received the correct information, it said. It had wrongly interpreted that the closure of the URLs would block only specific content.
The court said Sections 35 and 36 of the constitution prohibited the state from closing mass media to eliminate their freedom to report news, and people’s freedom of communication.
It also cited Sections 3 and 20 of the Computer Crime Act and Section 9 of the executive decree, which empower the court to block illegal content but not the communication channels of mass media organisations and people.
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