Fri Oct 5, 1:16 pm ET

Myanmar Internet Shutdown Is Human Rights Abuse: UN Telecom Chief


GENEVA -- The decision by Myanmar's military-led government to block access to the Internet from within the country violated its citizens' right to communicate, the head of the U.N. telecoms agency said Friday.

Secure access to the Internet is a basic human freedom that "needs to be preserved, no matter what," said Hamadoun Toure, secretary-general of the International Telecommunication Union.

"No government has the right to cut off its citizens from cyberspace," he told reporters in Geneva.

The Myanmar government shut down the country's Internet service providers last month as part of a crackdown on the biggest anti-regime rebellion in nearly two decades.

Dissidents and foreigners had used the Internet to get word of the government's brutal quashing of the protests to the outside world.

The government says 10 people were killed but oppositions groups say up to 200 people died when security forces attacked demonstrators who were largely led by Buddhist monks.

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon told the Security Council that Myanmar's military rulers have to "take bold actions towards democratization and respect for human rights," which observers say are regularly abused in the Southeast Asian country.

"What is wrong in the conventional world is wrong in cyberspace as well," Toure said.

Bloggers from at least 45 countries joined forces on Thursday for an online protest against Myanmar's efforts to keep citizens from sending photographs, videos and reports to the outside world.