Watchdogs in Turkey Still Waiting on Ruling to Unblock YouTube

May 30, 2014 03:35 PM EDT | Matt Mercuro

Turkish telecoms watchdog BTK has still not yet received a ruling by Turkey's top court ordering the removal of a block on video-sharing website YouTube.

The Constitutional Court on Thursday ruled that a block, imposed by Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan's government, was a violation of rights.

YouTube has been blocked for the past two months.

The site remained inaccessible to most people in Turkey nearly 24 hours after the ruling was confirmed, according to Reuters.

The court ruled on May 29 that it has not yet written its full report on the issue. A source at the BTK confirmed to Reuters that it was not clear when they would receive a decision.

This is the second ban imposed by the government to be overturned by the Constitutional Court.

In April, the court ordered the ban on Twitter to be lifted after the authorities shut down access right before local elections.

The government imposed blocks on the media sites after supposed audio recordings revealing corruption in Erdogan's inner circle were leaked.

U.S. Ambassador Francis Ricciardone welcomed the Constitutional Court's ruling, calling it a boost freedom of expression in Turkey.

"We are not judges of Turkey, but anything that increases freedom of expression, strengthens the freedom of expression is a good thing," Ricciardone said to reporters, according to Reuters.

Authorities have defied orders from lesser courts to lift the YouTube ban so far however, claiming some offending content has still not been removed from the website.

Erdogan has publicly criticized the Constitutional Court for "acting against national interests," according to Reuters.

The Prime Minister has called for the Twitter ban to be re-instated on a number of occasions recently. 

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