It has been claimed that the US-based social networking platform Facebook has failed to prevent calls for hate speech and violence against Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar.
In the report shared with The Associated Press, it was noted that the non-governmental organization “Global Witness”, a human rights defender, applied for 8 paid advertisements containing hate speech to test Facebook’s controls.
In the report, it was pointed out that advertisements containing genocide, hate and humiliation expressions such as “The current killings are not enough, more is needed”, “They are dirty and have poor hygiene”, are approved by Facebook to be published.
In withdrawing the ads, the Global Witness group criticized Facebook for failing even in the simplest of attempts, despite promises of tighter control of the site, for its role in the genocide of Rohingya.
In the report, which emphasized that similar ads are still being published on Facebook sites in Myanmar, Rosie Sharpe from Global Witness said, “The few ads we gave were an experiment, but the result shows that the overwhelming majority of hate speech ads are very likely to pass.” made its assessment.
Facebook admitted it wasn’t doing enough in 2018
Facebook, which has more than 20 million users in Myanmar, admitted in 2018 that it did not do enough to prevent incitement of violence and hate speech against Rohingya people.
The United Nations (UN) also accused Facebook of being “slow and ineffective” in spreading cyberhate in 2018.
A large number of Rohingya refugees living in the UK and the USA filed a $150 billion lawsuit against the social media giant Facebook on December 7, 2021, accusing them of allowing hate speech against them to spread in Myanmar.
Ethnic cleansing of Rohingya Muslims
In 2012, clashes broke out between Buddhists and Muslims in Myanmar’s Arakan state, thousands of people, mostly Muslims, were killed, and hundreds of homes and businesses were set on fire.
Citing the simultaneous attacks on the border posts in Arakan on August 25, 2017, the Myanmar army and Buddhist nationalists launched mass violence.
According to the UN, after August 2017, the number of people who fled the oppression and persecution in Arakan and took refuge in Bangladesh has exceeded 900 thousand.
International human rights organizations proved that hundreds of villages were destroyed with the satellite images they published.
The UN and international human rights organizations refer to violence against Rohingya as “ethnic cleansing” or “genocide”.
