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.
Following is
the English translation of the original notice posted on
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