Google Inc rejected a request by the White House on Friday to reconsider
its decision to keep online a controversial YouTube movie clip that has
ignited anti American protests in the Middle East.
The Internet
company said it was censoring the video in India and Indonesia after
blocking it on Wednesday in Egypt and Libya, where U.S. embassies have
been stormed by protestors enraged over depiction of the Prophet
Mohammad as a fraud and philanderer.
On Tuesday, the U.S. Ambassador to Libya and three other Americans were killed in a fiery siege on the embassy in Benghazi.
Google said was further restricting the clip to comply with local law rather than as a response to political pressure.
"We've
restricted access to it in countries where it is illegal such as India
and Indonesia, as well as in Libya and Egypt, given the very sensitive
situations in these two countries," the company said. "This approach is
entirely consistent with principles we first laid out in 2007."
White
House officials had asked Google earlier on Friday to reconsider
whether the video had violated YouTube's terms of service. The
guidelines can be viewed at
http://www.youtube.com/t/community_guidelines.
Google said on Wednesday that the video was within its guidelines.
U.S.
authorities said on Friday that they were investigating whether the
film's producer, Nakoula Basseley Nakoula, a 55-year old Egyptian Coptic
Christian living in Southern California, had violated terms of his
prison release. Basseley was convicted in 2010 for bank fraud and
released from prison on probation last June.
Copyright Thomson Reuters 2012