Al-Jazeera.net is one of the top 10 most innovative and influential websites in online politics, according to PoliticsOnline - a specialist in using the internet for political and public affairs.

Announcing the world's top 10 political sites at the 5th World Forum on eDemocracy in Paris last week, judges described Al-Jazeera as 'the symbol of free expression in the Middle East'.

"Certainly when it comes to censorship we have suffered a great deal," said Al-Jazeera spokesperson Jihad Ballout.

"We've had more than our fair share of attention from the powers that be, but we've maintained as independent a line as possible."

In September, Iraq's interim government extended an indefinite ban on Al-Jazeera TV, claiming that the station may encourage kidnappings by showing pictures of hostages. In 2002, Bahrain banned Al-Jazeera, accusing it of Israeli bias.

Despite these setbacks, Al-Jazeera has prevailed to become the 'world's foremost uncensored Arab news service', said the judges.

PoliticsOnline asked its 40,000 readers to name the people and organisations which they believed had the biggest impact on internet politics. A panel of experts then selected the top 10 from 292 nominations.

Others making the grade included the BBC, citizen journalism site Ohmynews and Stainless Steel Mouse, a Chinese cyber dissident who writes against government censorship in China.

The BBC was commended for its political news as well as the grassroots political project iCan, which encourages political debate and activity through discussion and campaign tools.

"We are witnessing virtual revolutions in the way we do politics in the 21st century," said Phil Noble, PoliticsOnline CEO, speaking at the forum.

"With this announcement, we honour the most innovative ideas and the most influential individuals in the world of internet and politics."

The George W Bush and John Kerry presidential campaign sites both made it onto the winners' podium, as did Election Europe, which develops secure internet voting systems.

US presidential campaign manager Joe Trippi was praised for his pioneering work online, in particular for organising grassroots support for Howard Dean.

MoveOn was also chosen because of its groundbreaking work using the internet as a tool to raise funds and awareness for political issues.

Brighton-based editor Dan Jellinek rounds up the chosen few for his work on E-Government Bulletin, the 'first and best email' news service on teledemocracy and electronic public services. E-Government Bulletin was also the first email newsletter in the UK to be officially audited by ABCE.

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See also:
PoliticsOnline: http://www.politicsonline.com
Al-Jazeera: http://english.aljazeera.net
BBC: http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/ican
Ohmynews: http://english.ohmynews.com
E-Government Bulletin: http://www.headstar.com/egb

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