The Myanmar Post and Telecommunications (MPT), a government agency, broadcast on state-run television this week tough new regulations for internet users. Prohibitions include publishing anything on the net that is "detrimental" to Burma or "directly or indirectly detrimental to the current policies and secret security affairs of the government".
"Writings related to politics are not to be posted," the broadcast said.
All media are tightly controlled by the state in Burma, which has been ruled by the military since 1962. Under existing law, possession of a computer or fax, or setting up an unauthorised computer network, is punishable with jail terms of up to 15 years.
Last month, the two local private email providers using overseas servers were suspended by the government, which announced that the MPT was to be the sole agency authorised to provide email. There is now no internet provider in the country.
The regime is sensitive to the large volume of websites and newsgroups set up overseas by exiled dissidents and foreign supporters of the opposition leader and 1991 Nobel prize laureate, Aung San Suu Kyi. Her party won the country's last elections in May 1990 but she remains under house arrest in the capital Rangoon.
The rules specify that users of the MPT's internet service must obtain "prior permission from the organisation designated by the state to create web pages". Any violators of the regulations will face "legal action" and have their accounts suspended.
