The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia has logged a number of complaints against a range of domain names including .gay, .catholic and .virgin.
The country's authorities sent more than 160 objections to ICANN, who manage web addresses, following news of plans to set up a number of new domain names.
The new domain names, which will join existing suffixes such as .com and .co.uk, are set to go live next year. The full list of proposed top-level domain names will bring the total number from 364 to over 2,000.
In the objection to each suffix, the Saudi government outlines its reasons for challenging it in great detail.
It objected to .gay labelling it "offensive" adding that "many societies and cultures consider homosexuality to be contrary to their culture, morality or religion".
Domain names the Saudis objected to include:
- .gay
- .catholic
- .virgin
- .pub
- .baby
- .islam
- .tattoo
- .wine
- .casino
- .vodka
- .poker
- .wtf
- .sucks
The government morally objects to .pub and .bar for fear that they would be "detrimental to public order and morals", and to .baby incase it "is used in the same way as .XXX to host pornographic websites".
In its complaint about the suffix .catholic - which the Vatican has paid the $185,000 fee to bid to create - the Saudi government writes: “Many other Christians use the term 'Catholic' to refer more broadly to the whole Christian Church regardless of denominational affiliation.”