A car belonging to YemenPortal, was vandalized today. Editor Walid Al-Saqaf indicated in a note that he believes official representatives of the Yemeni government directly responsible. He believes the action was a result of his attempt to provide alternative URLs for his site. He created an alternative domain and emailed it to several hundred subscribers in Yemen. Al-Saqaf is currently in Sweden. His car was parked outside YemenPortal’s office in Sana’a.

It’s bad enough to repress someone’s ability to freely report the news. Direct thuggery is beyond the pale, though, and the government of Yemen, and its leaders, especially President Ali Abdullah Saleh, should feel shame.

Al-Saqaf’s press release follows.

Press Release

Following the ban of its second domain

Unidentified men attack vehicle of YemenPortal.net Sana’a Office
Sanaa – February 11, 2008

Three unidentified men attacked and shattered the front glass (windscreen) of the vehicle operated by YemenPortal.net’s office in Sana’a, Yemen just before midnight on Sunday, February 10.

This comes after a third alternative website domain was set up in a record time after the Yemeni authorities banned the website’s domain for the second successive time. This resistance to the block may have been the motive behind the attack, the website founder and administrator Walid Al-Saqaf said.

Yemeni authorities had previously blocked the original domain of the website (http://yemenportal.net) on Jan 19 and proceeded to block the alternative domain (http://arabiaportal.net/yemen) on Feb 9. The third domain (http://yemenportal.org) was set up immediately after the second domain was blocked.

“We expect the authorities to go on blocking the third domain, after which we will simply launch a fourth. This will go on for as long as it takes.” Al-Saqaf noted.

The attack also comes in a time YemenPortal.net is leading a country-wide campaign against blocking Yemeni websites. The initiative was to allow all Internet users in Yemen to access the full content of all blocked news and opinion websites, which are accessible through the campaign’s website http://yemenportal.net/blocked. The authorities had initiated a new wave of bans against political websites without disclosing any reasons.

Al-Saqaf noted that eye witnesses said a taxi driver and two passengers, of whom one was masked, suddenly stopped near the car and kept on smashing the windscreen with rocks until neighbors started approaching. Then they returned to the taxi and quickly fled the scene.

None of the eyewitnesses were able to read the car’s plate number but some noticed a portrait of President Ali Abdullah Saleh on the back window of the taxi.

A complaint was filed at the closest police station immediately after the attack, which is believed to have been in response to the website’s successful initiative in launching the first anti-blocking campaign of its kind in Yemen.

It is worth noting that the authorities have in the past used various methods and means from sending SMS messages to beating journalists or smashing vehicles. “This is far too familiar”, Al-Saqaf said, adding that “If the attack is intended to threaten us or send us a message of intimidation, I would like to stress that it only strengthens our position and encourages us to continue our mission of fighting for the unblocking of more than a dozen websites that are banned by the authorities.”

Concerned human rights and press freedom organizations in Yemen have pledged to take action to condemn this attack and call upon the authorities to investigate the incident promptly and bring the perpetrators to justice. They also stressed on the need to release the blocked websites, whose ban constitutes a major violation of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which was ratified by the Yemeni government.

“The recent attacks against the press in general and the online media in particular lead us to believe that the government’s inaction in the past have encouraged some elements to attack journalists and media professionals with a sense of immunity.” Al-Saqaf said.

“The wave of website bans and other types of intimidation against the online media is in clear contradiction to the government’s pledges and commitments to bolster freedom of expression. We call upon the government to respect those commitments and urge the international community to help us resist this unprecedented wave of attacks.”