Hamburg  - Users of YouTube, the online video service, lost access Wednesday to a vast array of contemporary music in Europe's biggest nation after a dispute with a German fees agency escalated.

"This video is not available in your country," said a message when computers connected to the internet in Germany tried for example to open YouTube's Viva la Vida clip by British rock bank Coldplay.

YouTube, which belongs to US company Google and is the world's biggest online video platform, began late Tuesday to gradually block German access to music provided by main labels EMI, Sony Music and Universal and by many smaller recording companies.

It was hitting back against a demand from Gema, a German public agency that collects a performing-right fees, for 1 euro cent per video download. Gema, which has annual turnover of 850 million euros (1.13 billion dollars) represents writers and music publishers

In November 2007, when YouTube opened a German-language portal, it agreed with Gema on a lump-sum deal which remains confidential. That deal expired on Tuesday, the end of March, and no new contract has been agreed.

Sebastian Hornik, a spokesman for Sony Germany, said, "We very much regret this situation. YouTube is a very important channel to promote our music and artists."

Bettina Mueller, a Gema spokeswoman, said, "We do understand how important YouTube is to both fans and artists."

The dispute has come to a head over two issues: the level of fees and disclosure.

A YouTube executive, Patrick Walker, said Gema's 1-cent demand was out of proportion to what the German agency charged compact disc vendors, given that users often watched videos many times over.

He added that the equivalent British agency, PRS for Music, had sought only one quarter as much and even that amount far exceeded YouTube's ability to pay. Gema replied that 1 cent was just an opening gambit, but YouTube had declined to negotiate.

In the disclosures dispute, Gema is demanding logs of how often videos are viewed, whereas YouTube is demanding a complete list of the artists which Gema represents. Artists can opt out of Gema's services.

"We don't want this conflict to escalate," responded Gema's Mueller. (dpa)