As technology advances, the
access to the Internet has become extremely easy and the frequencies of
expression of thoughts on-line and off-line are almost the same these days. Thanapol
Eawsakul, the editor of Fah Diew Khan magazine was arrested for leaving
a comment against the military rules on Facebook and people say that this
arrestment is unreasonable. Thai government banned Thanapol from making
political comments, becoming involved in polictical activities, and traveling
overseas without permission from NCPO. Thai government’s effort to silence
critics increases the citizens’ doubts towards Thai junta. Thai junta is trying to restrict
people’s freedom of expression on-line by secretly vacuuming up Facebook data.
When junta asked
Facebook to hand junta Thai people’s personal information, Facebook rejected,
so the government created a misleading Facebook application to acquire its
citizens’ information. When Thai people try to get on to one of the more than
200 government’s restricted websites, people will have to click either “log in
with Facebook” button or “close” button. That way, people who log in with
Facebook and access the restricted page will get caught and be punished. After
leaving a criticism on Facebook, Thanapol received a phone call from an unidentified
military officer and the officer asked him to come to the meeting to exchange
opinions and assured that he will not arrest him. But when Thanapol went to the
meeting, a man took him to military custody and gave him the seven-day
administrative detention.
Even after the
military authorities announced that they would stop arresting people, so many
people were unreasonably arrested. Thai government is violating Article 19 of
Universal Declaration of Human Rights—everyone has the right to freedom of
opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without
interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any
media and regardless of frontiers—by accessing people’s Facebook information
and restricting their
freedom of expression. This news
article surprised me because I don’t want my government to know which websites
I access and what posts or comments I leave on social network. If this had happened
in America, people would have had stronger response towards the government. I think
Thai people should stand together against Thai
junta and get the right to the freedom of expression back.
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