Hout of the Ministry of Culture and Information has said that four licenses have so far been issued for Internet news websites while 20 sites including forums and personal blogs have been registered free of charge under new online publishing laws. “The sites that have been given licenses are ‘electronic newspapers', traditional media sites, commercial advertising sites, as well as those for broadcasting news text messages via mobile telephones,” Al-Hout said. The sites that have decided to register themselves with the ministry, he said, were “blogs, forums and personal websites”. He said that by applying for licenses and registering, site owners “make themselves known to the ministry which can then cooperate with them and offer invitations to conferences and events and issue journalism cards for access to any function”. Al-Hout denied that the purpose of the move is to monitor sites and their owners, saying that Article 13 of the executive by-law for electronic press publishing stipulates responsibility for what is published. “Electronic publishing is not subject in all its forms to monitoring by the relevant authority,” he said. According to Al-Hout, the legal administration at the Ministry of Culture is currently studying a number of areas for “incentives and support to the press and electronic sites”. He added that licenses had no bearing on breaches of rights, the penalties for which are currently under study by the ministry. “The absence of a license does not exempt electronic sites from penalties,” he said. “The ministry looks into any claim against electronic sites whether they are in possession of licenses or not.” He said that some violations made by sites are “not the jurisdiction of the Ministry of Culture and Information”. “Those cases are looked into by other authorities dedicated to electronic crimes, which include disseminating extremist ideas or blackmail and others,” he said.
