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BEIRUT: Regrettable as it is, its not really surprising that censorship of media, media activists and bloggers increases during periods of political tension. Less expected, perhaps, is the increase in incidents of cultural censorship.

The alarming security situation in 2013 had a negative impact on media and cultural freedom in Lebanon, writes Firas Talhouk in the SKeyes Center for Media and Cultural Freedoms annual report on press and cultural freedom in the Levant.

Released last month, SKeyes report recorded official bans on three films, a play and a foreign publication in 2013; two additional acts of cultural censorship resulted from pressure from unofficial bodies.

These statistics may not seem particularly high officers from General Securitys Censorship Bureau say they annually review roughly 300 films and plays for approval but they display a marked increase from 2012, when several films were partially censored but no outright bans were issued.

We always feel that there is some kind of parallel between political tensions and censorship in the country, Skeyes executive director Ayman Mhanna tells The Daily Star. In periods where things are okay, the number of censorship decisions decreases. In periods of tension, even when the movies have nothing to do with politics, theres an increase. I cant say its causality but there is definitely a relationship between the two.

Lea Baroudi, co-founder and general coordinator of anti-censorship NGO March, whose online Virtual Museum of Censorship records incidents of cultural censorship since 1940, says she too has noticed the correlation. Incidents of cultural censorship, she notes, have been increasing since late 2010.

Theres growing sectarian tension in the country and in the region, she explains, so I think this is affecting [censorship] wrongly so, because art and culture are supposed to bring people together. Theyre tools for peace, but they are being censored more because of these tensions ... [censors] are much more careful these days, especially when it comes to politics or religion.

Officers at the Censorship Bureau deny any correlation between Lebanons political climate and increased censorship of cultural production. Censorship does not tend to increase or decrease during any political or security situation, said General Mounir Akiki, who has been in charge of the Censorship Bureau since 2011, because it depends only on the laws and codes that govern censorship.

The authority to make cuts to films, plays, music, art and books, and to ban them outright, Akiki explains, lies with the National Committee of Information, the Film Censorship Committee (which includes four ministerial representatives), the interior minister, the information minister and the attorney general.

General Security has the authority to recommend a course of action but, Akiki stressed, they dont write the laws. They simply enforce existing censorship legislation much of which dates from before or during the Civil War.

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