AOL Chooses, Then Deletes Burma Jun

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Subject: AOL Chooses, Then Deletes Burma Junta Web Page


Free Burma Coalition                www.freeburmacoalition.org

Contact: Dr. Zarni, Free Burma Coalition, zarni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx, 202-777-6009

For Immediate Release:


America Online Chooses, Then Deletes Burma Junta Web Page

Dulles, Virginia -- August 18, 1999 -- America Online, the leading
internet Service provider in the United States, has made an abrupt
about-face.  

On Friday August 13th, AOL chose the site www.myanmar.com to be linked to
AOL's Asia Forum.  The problem?  The site is operated by the ruling
military junta of Burma (also known as Myanmar), identified by Reporters
Sans Frontieres as one of the world's "real enemies" of the internet.

The Burmese junta jails citizens for "unauthorized" use of fax,
photocopiers and computers with modems.  Internet service, including AOL,
is unavailable to all of Burma's 46 million citizens, save a few
"authorized" friends of the regime.

Ironically, an email message from Burma's Office of Strategic Services
(the secret police) alerted exiled Burmese democrats to AOL's gaffe.  The
message copied AOL's announcement, which gushed "We think you'll notice
dramatically increased usage because of this exposure."

Though an international pariah, the junta makes extensive use of the
internet to distribute its propaganda.  The website in question,
www.myanmar.com, is mostly used to lure hard-currency-carrying tourists.
But elsewhere the page compiles vituperative articles from the
junta-controlled press. Burmese democracy leader and Nobel Peace Laureate
Aung San Suu Kyi comes in for particular scorn, often called a "sorceress"
or a "lackey of colonialists."  The more than 100,000 Burmese refugees
huddled in Thailand are labelled "terrorists," though groups such as
Amnesty International say they are vicitms of rape, torture, forced labor
and murder.

"We informed AOL of the fact that the junta operates this page, and gave
them some information about pervasive human rights violations in Burma,"
says Dr. Zarni, Burmese founder of the Free Burma Coalition. "It looked
bad for an 'information technology' company to be leading its users to the
propaganda page of a regime that has closed the universities and
restricted all kinds of information, including the internet.  To their
credit, AOL reacted quickly," he adds.

AOL informed the Free Burma Coalition on Tuesday, August 17 that "we have
removed the website in question from the International Country Pages."

END