The new ruling junta in Myanmar has blocked access to Twitter and Instagram, after users flocked there in response to the military pulling the plug on Facebook. A popular messaging app was also experiencing outages.
Authorities blocked access to Twitter as users migrated there following a bar on FacebookImage: imago-images/imagebroker/T. Jeager
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Myanmar's new military rulers ordered service providers on Friday to obstruct user access to Twitter and Instagram until "further notice," according to Telenor Myanmar. The local branch of a Norway-based company is one of the main telecom providers in the South Asian country.
The move is the latest in a series of internet blocks to stifle dissent, only days after a coup that drew global condemnation.
A spokeswoman for Twitter said the move "undermines the public conversation and the rights of people to make their voices heard."
"We will continue to advocate to end destructive government-led shutdowns," she said.
Facebook was the first platform to be blocked, on Wednesday. The coup leaders shut down access to the platform, which counts half of Myanmar's 54 million population as users, until February 7.
Why is Twitter being targeted?
By Thursday, internet users in Myanmar had flocked to Twitter where they unleashed a hashtag campaign against the military putsch. The Twitter outages began late on Friday at about 10 p.m. local time (1530 UTC/GMT).
"Twitter is now being restricted in #Myanmar on multiple network providers," said the monitor group NetBlocks, which tracks internet outages around the world.
NetBlocks also said the Facebook products Whatsapp and Instagram were also facing disruptions.
Telenor Myanmar said it was "gravely concerned" by the bans on Twitter and Instagram.
The provider "has challenged the necessity and proportionality of the directive... and highlighted the directive's contradiction with international human rights law," they said in a statement.
Why does the junta seem so concerned?
Anti-coup activist Thinza Shunlei Yi urged the setting up of a free VPN service so users could circumvent the restrictions.
"We have digital power... so we've been using this since day one to oppose the military junta," Shunlei Yi was reported as saying.
The "Civil Disobedience Movement" has gathered pace online, with the public urged to show their anger at the coup each night by banging pots and cymbals. Police have arrested individuals involved in such protests.
The AFP news agency said it had seen an unverified Ministry of Transport and Communications document. The correspondence claimed that Twitter and Instagram were used to "spread incitement and false news... causing misunderstanding among the public."
A representative for Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy said she was being held at her home in Naypyidaw, the country's capital. Suu Kyi was said to be "in good health."
A key figure in Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy party, Win Htein, was arrested in the early hours of Friday morning.
Aung San Suu Kyi: From freedom fighter to pariah
Myanmar's Aung San Suu Kyi had the global community rooting for her when she was the world's most famous political prisoner. But in recent years she was accused of standing by while soldiers massacred Rohingya Muslims.
Image: Reuters
Darling of democracy
Aung San Suu Kyi, the daughter of Myanmar's assassinated founding father Aung San, returned to her home country in the late 1980s after studying and starting a family in England. She became a key figure in the 1988 uprisings against the country's military dictatorship. Her National League for Democracy (NLD) was victorious in 1990 elections, but the government refused to honor the vote.
Image: dapd
Military rule
Suu Kyi spent 15 of the 21 years between 1989 and 2010 under house arrest. After 1995, the rights advocate was barred from seeing her two sons and husband, Michael Aris, even after the latter was diagnosed with cancer. Aris, seen here displaying an honorary doctorate awarded to his wife, died in 1999.
Image: TORSTEN BLACKWOOD/AFP
'The Lady'
Suu Kyi's determination to bring democracy and human rights to her country won her international renown, including the 1991 Nobel Peace Prize. She was so popular that in 2011 famous French director Luc Besson made a biopic of her life starring Malaysian actor Michelle Yeoh. Suu Kyi was often called the world's most famous political prisoner.
Image: picture alliance/dpa/Seven Media/Doha Film Institute
Sworn in as lawmaker
Decades of campaigning finally paid off, and in 2012 Suu Kyi was allowed to run in free elections. She won a seat in parliament as Myanmar began its transition away from military government. After general elections in 2015, she became the country's de facto civilian leader, although officially she held the post of foreign minister and state counselor — a role akin to prime minister.
Image: AP
Persecution of the Rohingya
Rohingya, a mostly Muslim ethnic group, had their citizenship revoked by Myanmar's Buddhist-majority government in 1982. Long persecuted, their plight intensified in 2016 when Myanmar's military began what it called "clearance" of illegal immigrants. Groups such as Human Rights Watch have described it as "ethnic cleansing." Thousands have died, and hundreds of thousands have fled their homes.
Image: Reuters/D. Siddiqui
Fall from grace
When she became state counselor in 2016, Suu Kyi set up a commission to investigate claims of atrocities against the Rohingya in Rakhine state. Suu Kyi accused the Rohingya of spreading "a huge iceberg of misinformation," and said she was concerned by the "terrorist threat" posed by extremists. Her stance sparked protests in Muslim-majority countries around the world.
Image: picture-alliance/Zumapress/J. Laghari
Nobel no more?
Due to her handling of the Rohingya crisis, Suu Kyi was stripped of various honors and lost much of her international support. The Nobel committee was forced to issue a statement saying that her peace prize could not be revoked. Fellow Nobel laureate Malala Yousafzai called on Suu Kyi to "stop the violence." Suu Kyi said that outsiders could not grasp the complexities of the situation.
Image: picture-alliance/dpa
A controversial election
In 2020, Myanmar's ruling National League for Democracy party won the November 8 general election, with enough seats to form the next government. However, the military's proxy party, the Union Solidarity and Development party, claimed fraud and demanded a new election supervised by the military. With that came comments alluding to a possible coup. Supporters of the party also marched in protest.
Image: Shwe Paw Mya Tin/REUTERS
Military detains Suu Kyi
Myanmar's civilian leader, along with several of her political allies, were detained in an early morning raid on February 1, 2021 led by the military. The move came amid escalating tensions between the civilian government and army, which had been in control for decades.The junta claimed electoral fraud, announced a yearlong state of emergency and named a former general as acting president.
Image: Franck Robichon/REUTERS
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Teachers and students in Myanmar have rallied against the coup. Friday saw hundreds protest at a Myanmar university. It appeared to be the largest show of public dissent within the country since the coup.
Protesters at two universities in Yangon flashed a three-fingered salute, a sign of resistance originally adopted from "The Hunger Games" movies by anti-government protesters in neighboring Thailand.
Myanmar was under military rule for five decades after a 1962 coup. While Suu Kyi's five years as the nation's effective leader have represented a brief period of relative democracy, the country's authorities have continued to apply repressive colonial-era laws and engage in ethnic conflict.
