Facebook said that the UN report and other international experts “have found evidence that many of these individuals and organizations committed or enabled serious human rights abuses in the country. And we want to prevent them from using our service to further inflame ethnic and religious tensions.” Earlier this month, Facebook said that it was building on its efforts to fight the spread of hate speech on its platform, including greater investment in artificial intelligence that can spot problematic posts, and making it easier for people to report such posts.

In March, a UN official said that the social network had “turned into a beast” in the country.

Richard Horsey, a consultant on Myanmar to non-profit organization International Crisis Group, called the development “very significant” given Facebook’s dominance in the country. Mark Farmaner, director of the Burma Campaign UK, however, added that the culpability of spreading hate speech on Facebook did not just lie with the military, but also with Aung San Suu Kyi’s office. The UN report also said that the civilian government led by Suu Kyi failed to take action to stem the proliferation of hate speech.

Facebook is far and away the dominant social network in Myanmar, where many people simply use it in place of the internet. A Reuters investigation published this month into Facebook’s role in and handling of the Rohingya crisis said that the company had for years dedicated few resources to the nation, both in terms of money and people. Facebook still doesn’t employ anybody in the country, it said, and instead outsources its monitoring of hate speech in Myanmar through consulting firm Accenture.

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