Iran gets broadband Internet access

THE ISLAMIC REPUBLIC of Iran is to get ADSL broadband Internet for the first time, an AFP report on Al Jazeera said.

A private firm, Pars Online, has secured a deal to set up "at least 20,000 portals" this year, the firm said on Friday. A spokesman claimed the move was a first step towards privatising telecommmunications in the country. Pars Online is based in Tehran, with offices in Dubai and London.

The company reckons there are around three million Internet users in Iran, a country with a population of around 66 million. The main objective of its broadband service, it seems, is to get banks, and businesses online.

Iranian authorities are concerned with limiting Internet access in the country, mainly, they say, because of the corrupting influence of Internet porn.

Meanwhile, Amnesty International has seen fit to criticise Cuba for its own attempts to restrict Internet access on the island.

The human rights body said new measures, introduced on January 10th, limit unofficial Internet use and "constitute yet another attempt to cut off Cubans' access to alternative views and a space for discussing them."

The new law limits Internet access to special telephone accounts payable in US dollars. Ordinary Cubans don't have many dollars.

Amnesty said it "fears that the new measures are intended to prevent human rights monitoring by restricting the flow of information out of Cuba." It points at the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which, in its article 19, guarantees the right to freedom of opinion and expression, including the freedom to "seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers".

The Cuban government says its tightened controls are designed to control fraudulent use of the Interweb. It says the restrictions are necessary because Cuba has only limited Internet access and widening access could bring down its infrastructure altogether. µ

L'INQS
Al Jazeera
Pars Online
Amnesty International