According to a notice from the former web administrator of an ethnic Mongolian students’ forum named “Nutag” (www.nutuge.net), this forum was forcefully shut down by the web hosting company on February 27, 2004, under the Inner Mongolia Public Security Bureau’s allegation of “violating the state laws”. As one of the most popular forums in Inner Mongolia, nutuge.net was created in 2002 and managed by the Mongolian students within the border of China. The main topic discussed in the forum was Mongolian culture, history, language, and literature. Like any other Internet forums in China, nutuge.net always avoided to discuss about the authorities’ so-called “sensitive issues” such as ethnic, political, and religious issues.

Notice of “Nutuge” Forum:

At 1:00 am, February 27, 2004, “Nutuge” Forum uploaded 16 new songs and sent a website update notice to the forum members via 6,000 e-mails;

At 7:35 pm, February 27, 2004, “Nutuge” Forum server (nutuge.net) was forcefully shut-down by its web hosting company;

At 8:30 pm, February 27, 2004, I sent e-mail to the web hosting company to ask about the reason. But there is no response;

At 9:00, February 27, 2004, after a careful reading of the server administration help documentation, I found a notice on the login server interface warning that “Using the server to send junk mails is strictly prohibited! Account will be closed if discovered!” At the beginning I thought the server was shut down for sending e-mails to the members;

At 0:45 am, February 28, 2004, I posted an urgent notice on the home page of nutuge.com to explain the reason of the server shut-down;

At 12:30 pm, February 28, 2004, I sent my second e-mail with my personal contact to the web hosting to express my willingness to cooperate to solve the problem as soon as possible. Still no response;

At 10:45 am, March 1, 2004, I called the customer service of the web hosting and talked to the person in charge, and finally found out that the reason of the forceful shut-down of the server is that: at 7:30 pm, February 27, 2004, a member’s article posted on the forum was detected by the Public Security authorities duo to its content violating the state law. The Public Security authorities informed the IDC (Intelligence Disk Controller), and the IDC immediately disconnected the server provider’s Internet cable, interrupting its entire service. But, after the close of the forum account, other servers are working normally;

At 10:50 am, March 1, 2004, having known the reason of the server shut-down, once again I called the web hosting company and left my personal contact to express my willingness to cooperate for the immediate solution;

At 8:45 pm, March 4, 2004, after a careful consideration, I decided to reveal the truth of the server shut-down to the public;

At 9:15 pm, March 4, 2004, I completed the notice.

Nutuge Forum

http://www.nutuge.net

Web Administrator: Erden

E-mail: aed@chd.edu.cn

9:20 pm March 4, 2004