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Strasbourg, France • The European Court of Human Rights has ruled that Turkey violated the European Convention on Human Rights by blocking access to YouTube.
A group of three Turkish law teachers had taken the case to the court in 2010 after a Turkish criminal court ordered the blocking of access to YouTube for more than two years because some videos videos were available that were "insulting to the memory" of Mustapha Kemal Ataturk — the first president of the republic of Turkey.
The European Court of Human Rights ruled on Tuesday that the blocking order had affected the teachers' "right to receive and impart information" and that there had been a "violation of Article 10 (freedom of expression) of the European Convention on Human Rights."