Indonesian minister blames new media for Arab 'turmoil'

Indonesia's communications minister Thursday lamented the role of social media in Arab democracy movements and warned the government to control websites like Facebook and Twitter. In a speech to school children, Tifatul Sembiring said new media had caused turmoil in the Arab world, where popular uprisings ousted the autocratic leaders of Egypt and Tunisia and brought the Libyan regime to its knees. "The government has the authority to control the Internet," he told elementary school students in central Jakarta at the launch of a "Healthy Internet" campaign, according to Detiknews website. "Don't let things happen like in Tunisia and Libya, which failed to control social media such as Facebook and Twitter, and they caused turmoil there. People are free to express their opinion, but they must be responsible." The minister, a conservative Muslim and prolific user of microblogging site Twitter, has campaigned strongly against pornography and introduced electronic filtering to block smut from the Web. But his comments about the Arab world suggest he is also concerned about online political comment, of the sort that helped ignite popular unrest against corrupt autocrats in the Middle East. Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono is a strong supporter of Tifatul, and has himself warned that the "Internet frenzy" is threatening to destroy traditional values in the mainly Muslim country of 240 million people. The Southeast Asian archipelago has about 40 million Internet users, according to Internet World Stats, and is one of the most rapidly developing social media markets in the world. Tifatul made international headlines in November last year when he posted comments on Twitter expressing embarrassment about having to shake hands with visiting US First Lady Michelle Obama. Critics accused the minister -- who does not touch women he is not related to -- of bringing shame to the country. The minister has previously outraged liberal society by suggesting AIDS funding is a waste of public money and linking natural disasters to immorality. Human rights groups accuse Yudhoyono's government of using criminal defamation laws to silence and intimidate critics, especially those who spread their messages online.