KUWAIT CITY, Aug 5, (Agencies):  The Kuwait Cabinet and National Assembly must be cautious in handling issues related to people’s freedom to acquire knowledge and communicate with others, the Kuwait Human Rights Society (KHRS) said in a press statement Thursday.
Urging both authorities to confront attempts to limit the use of BlackBerry services or other communication devices, the society underlined the need to respect the freedom and privacy of citizens.  It has also pointed out that the Kuwaiti Constitution guarantees these rights, as stated in Articles 20 and 39.
KHRS expressed its concern over reports that Kuwait intends to follow in the footsteps of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) to suspend key BlackBerry services and Saudi Arabia, which stopped these services starting from Thursday.  The society contended the latest technological developments in the communications sector did not leave room for government regulation, especially for the regimes keen on knowing everything, including the thought processes of citizens.
Asserting that freedom cannot be partitioned, the society said social privacy and national security should not be used as justification to contain people’s freedom to communicate through the advanced devices, in the same manner that there are no plausible excuses for taking any procedure against the use of any type of mobile phone.  KHRS added the governments can negotiate with the manufacturing firms — whether local or foreign - to deal with these services in a way that protects everything related to national security.
Lebanon on Thursday became the latest Middle East state to voice security fears over BlackBerry smartphones, as the United States stepped in to the growing row over the popular devices.
Saudi Arabia is to suspend Blackberry services on Friday after the Canadian manufacturers failed to meet its demands, while the United Arab Emirates announced at the weekend that its own ban will take effect from October 11.
India is also mulling a similar move.
As the row spread, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said that the United States and the UAE would soon hold talks on the Gulf business hub’s halting of BlackBerry messenger, web browsing and email services.
“We are taking time to consult and analyze the full the range of interests and issues at stake because we know that there is a legitimate security concern,” Clinton told reporters in Washington.
But she said there was also a “legitimate right of free use and access” and added that the United States was also working with unspecified other countries on the issue.
The row centres on concerns that BlackBerry’s encrypted services — which involve data being routed through secure servers in Canada where manufacturer Research in Motion (RIM) is based — could be used by militants or criminals.
In Beirut, the chairman of Lebanon’s telecommunications regulator said Thursday it would assess concerns linked to the BlackBerry after the arrest of several telecoms employees suspected of spying for Israel.
“We need to make an arrangement with BlackBerry or come to an understanding with them that satisfies law enforcement concerns,” Imad Hoballah told AFP, adding that it planned to start talks with RIM next week.
Hoballah added that the move was not a reaction to the Saudi and UAE decisions.
Lebanon has arrested three suspects over the past month in an expanding probe into an alleged network of Israeli spies employed in its telecoms sector.
In conservative and highly security-conscious Saudi Arabia, BlackBerry users had access to services for what could be a final day — but many people welcomed the ban, saying the devices are corrupting the nation’s youth.
“My daughter collapsed once... She reads every SMS she receives and even replies to them late at night,” a woman named as Um Aisha was quoted as telling the Arab News.
The newspaper said an online survey of 331 people found 178 people opposed to the Saudi ban and 153 supporting it.
Saudi Arabia’s Communications and Information Technology Commission (CITC) said on Tuesday that it has ordered the kingdom’s three mobile phone providers to block BlackBerry services or face a 1.3-million-dollar fine.
The normally tech-savvy UAE, which was the first to announce a BlackBerry ban, has said its decision to ban BlackBerry services from October is final, though adding that it remains open to an “acceptable, regulatory-compliant solution”.
But a spokeswoman for RIM, quoted in Abu Dhabi’s The National newspaper, said the Torch version of the phone, due for release next week in the United States, will be available in the UAE from October.
“It’s business as usual for us,” the newspaper quoted her as saying.
Elswhere in the Middle East, Bahrain’s mobile provider Batelco said it already has alternative plans in case Bahrain imposes a ban, while VIVA Telecom in Kuwait said it would not block any BlackBerry services.
India is mulling restrictions but Indonesia on Thursday denied it was considering banning BlackBerry services, although it did not rule it out.
RIM founder and co-chief executive Mike Lazaridis has told The New York Times that allowing governments to monitor messages would imperil the firm’s ties with customers, including major corporations and law enforcement agencies.
While the popularity of Apple’s iPhone has soared because of its games, social networking, video watching and applications, BlackBerry has remained a favourite for business people seeking secure communications.
“This is about the Internet,” Lazaridis was quoted as saying in the interview. “Everything on the Internet is encrypted. This is not a BlackBerry-only issue. If they can’t deal with the Internet, they should shut it off.”
Shares of RIM fell nearly 2 percent in trading on the Nasdaq and Toronto stock exchange. The stock has lost about 8 percent of its value since the United Arab Emirates threatened over the weekend to ban BlackBerry email, messaging and Internet services after three years of negotiations with RIM over access to encrypted user data.
A broadening stand-off with global governments could hurt sentiment on RIM on Wall Street, which had initially been reassured that a ban by the Gulf states would affect a tiny portion of the BlackBerry’s more than 41 million subscribers.
Lazaridis acknowledged the company was in discussions with various governments, and said the issue will likely get resolved.
RIM has said BlackBerry security is based on a system where customers create their own key and the company neither has a master key nor any “back door” to enable RIM or third parties to gain access to crucial corporate data.
The company said Wednesday it has never provided anything unique to the government of one country and cannot accommodate any request for a copy of a customer’s encryption key.