By Bernama
Jakarta : The Communication and Information Ministry has asked the “YouTube” website to delete the flim ‘Fitna’ of Dutch politician Geert Wilders from its menu and is ready to close down the website if it does not comply.
“We have officially requested the deletion of the film. We will allow the website time for administrative adjustments but if they don’t do it, we will close them down,” ANTARA news agency quoted Communication and Information Minister Muhammad Nuh as saying here on Thursday.
If YouTube refused to scrap the film, the government would cut public access to the website with the help of the Internet Service Provider (ISP), he said.
Nuh said the government had sent its request to YouTube in writing and would wait for an answer until Thursday.
Earlier, President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono had stated world leaders bore the moral responsibility to prevent acts denigrating religion or culture such as was done by the film Fitna.
“In my view, world leaders have a moral responsibility to prevent things like this (circulation of the film Fitna) so that we will have a more secure and peaceful world,” the president told the press on Monday night.
He called on the international community to refrain from exercising freedom without limits because doing so would undermine the pillars of life in other respects.
Meanwhile, Islamic political scholar Prof Dr Azyumardi Azra said Muslims need to protest the production of the film Fitna because it had hurt the feelings of the world’s 1.3 billion Muslims.
“It must be protested against with the understanding that the protests are done in civil and peaceful ways in accordance with the high moral values of Islam,” Axra said.
Muslims should take care not to be provoked into committing acts that were counter-productive to the interests of Islam, the Islamic community and the Indonesian state, he said.
He said there was a positive side in the Dutch government’s attitude in rejecting the film because it equated Islam with violence.
Another Islamic figure, Muhammadiyah chairman Din Syamsuddin said the film Fitna had a great potential of fueling tension and hatred between civilizations, between Islam and the West in particular, Therefore, the film’s producer who was a member of the Dutch parliament deserved to be tried in an international court.
“Geert Wilders should be reported to the International Court of Justice as a cultural criminal,” Syamsuddin said in Jakarta on Tuesday.
It was only proper for Muslims to protest against the film but they need not become emotional about it because the dignity of Islam would not diminish by the insults of any party, he said.