Italians protest against controversial wiretap law

2011-10-07 19:18:20 GMT+7 (ICT)

ROME (BNO NEWS) -- Italian protesters on Thursday continued to rally outside the country's parliament in Rome to voice their opposition against a government attempt to curb the publication of leaked pre-trial wiretaps, the ANSA news agency reported on Friday.

Demonstrators wore gags to protest against what they consider to be an attack on freedom of information. The wiretap bill would allow reporters to only publish wiretaps in the form of summaries before trial.

Both the government and the opposition agree that the publication of gossip unrelated to probes should be banned, but the opposition sees the government's bill as an attack on the freedom of the press. The government said Thursday it expects to push the bill through parliament with a confidence vote next week, according to ANSA.

The Italian edition of Wikipedia earlier shut down all its pages to protest against the draft bill, which would severely limit publication of wiretapped conversations. Under the new bill, anyone found guilty of releasing or publishing wiretaps faces a jail sentence ranging from six months to three years.

The Wikimedia Foundation, which owns Wikipedia, expressed its support for the protest. "This bill would hinder the work of projects like Wikipedia: open, volunteer-driven, and collaborative spaces dedicated to sharing high-quality knowledge, not to mention the ability for all users of the internet to engage in democratic, free speech opportunities," said Jay Walsh, a spokesperson for the Wikimedia Foundation.

Italians have become used to wiretap leaks in the media, many of them filled with revelations concerning Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi's four trials regarding cases of alleged corruption and paying for sex with an underage prostitute.

-- © BNO News All rights reserved 2011-10-07

Berlusconi would like to be the 3rd millennium Mussolini.

Happy to do not live in Italy anymore.

Sad for how those people are reducing my country