Egyptian regulator appeals against court's YouTube ban.

Egyptian regulator appeals against court's YouTube ban.(AO).

Egyptian authorities appealed on Thursday against a court order banning the video file-sharing site YouTube for a month over an amateur video that denigrates the Prophet Mohammad, saying the ruling was unenforceable.

"The National Telecommunication Regulatory Authority has presented an appeal to halt implementation of the verdict," said a statement from the Ministry of Communications and Information Technology.
Egypt's administrative court ordered the ministries of communication and investment to block YouTube, owned by Google , inside the country because it had carried the film "Innocence of Muslims", said the state news agency MENA.
The low-budget 13-minute video, billed as a film trailer and made in California with private funding, provoked a wave of anti-American unrest in Egypt, Libya and dozens of other Muslim countries in September.
The video depicts the Prophet as a fool and a sexual deviant. For most Muslims, any portrayal of the Prophet is considered blasphemous.
A statement issued after talks between ministry officials and the telecoms regulator said it was technically impossible to shut down YouTube in Egypt without affecting Google's Internet search engine, incurring potentially huge costs and job losses. "The government cannot carry out the contents of the verdict within Egypt's borders," the statement said.
Only the United States had the capability to shut down YouTube, it said.
"Blocking YouTube would affect the search engine of Google, of which Egypt is the second biggest user in the Middle East," the statement said. This would cause losses to the economy of up to hundreds of millions of Egyptian pounds (tens of millions of dollars) and affect thousands of jobs, it added.
In a statement, Google said it had created a simple mechanism for legal authorities to request the blocking of content viewed as illegal.Read the full story here.

Egypt court slaps seven Coptic expatriates alleged makers of anti-Islam film with death sentences and American pastor Terry Jones with a five-year jail term.

Egypt court slaps seven Coptic expatriates alleged makers of anti-Islam film with death sentences and American pastor Terry Jones with a five-year jail term.(AhramOnline).A Cairo Criminal Court slapped seven Coptic expatriates with death sentences and American pastor Terry Jones with a five-year jail term for their alleged roles in the production last year of a short film that defames the Islamic faith, German news agency DPA reported on Tuesday. All the defendants were tried in absentia.
The court ruled the film in question, dubbed 'The Innocence of Muslims,' to be defamatory to Islam and the Prophet Mohammed and a potential threat to Egypt's national unity.
The seven convicted Coptic expatriates were: Maurice Sadiq Gerges, founder of a US-based Coptic association; Morkos Aziz, a US-based television presenter; Fekry Abdul-Messih, a US-based doctor; Nabil Adib, media coordinator for another US-based association; Nahid Metwally, an Australia-based doctor; Egyptian-born Copt Mark Baccil Youssef (charged with producing the film); and Nader Farid, a commerce graduate.
On 18 November, Egypt's State Security Court referred the requested death sentences to Egypt's Grand Mufti for his approval, in accordance with Egyptian law.
Gerges and Jones, the latter of whom is known for his public burnings of the Quran, are believed to have been involved in promoting the film but not in its production, according to reports in the Wall Street Journal.
The film sparked angry protests throughout much of the Islamic world, including Egypt and Libya, when it appeared online in September.
Egypt-based Coptic schoolteacher Bishoy Kamel was subsequently sentenced to six years in prison for sharing the film on Facebook.
Egyptian Coptic activist Alber Saber, meanwhile, also remains in detention in Egypt for also sharing the film online.Hmmmm.....'The future must not belong to those that slander the Prophet'....and my buddy Morsi.Read the full story here.