The Chinese government banned the use of Islamophobic words on social media, local news outlets reported Wednesday.
Terms created by Chinese social media users to “stigmatize Muslims” were blocked across various internet platforms in the country, Chinese daily Global Times said.
The daily said search results for “insults against Islam” were blocked on Chinese microblogging website and one the most popular social media sites Weibo.
Phrases including “green religion” and “peaceful religion,” which are used to refer to Islam, were also blocked as they were often used to get around censorship of online hate speech.
“It’s necessary to timely remove radical phrases that discriminate against Islam and are biased against Muslims to prevent worsening online hatred toward the group. Those phrases severely undermine religious harmony and ethnic unity,” Xiong Kunxin, a professor at Beijing’s Minzu University of China was quoted as saying by the Global Times.
China is home to a considerable Muslim minority consisting of more than 20 million people, most of whom live in restive Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region.
