Since the coup which overthrew premier Thaksin Shinawatra, Thailand's internet community is coming under increasing pressure to stop talking about politics.

Blogging had been seen as an alternative to the corporate dominant and politically biased Thailand print media. However now it seems that bloggers are being summoned to the Information and Communication Technology Ministry and ordered to delete comments.

More than 4,800 webpages have been blocked since March last year apparently because they contain content deemed insulting to Thailand's royal family. However some of the so called insulting posts have been comments about the government and not about the King.

Even the UK's  The Economist newspaper was pulled from the shelves by the Thai distributor in an act of self-censorship because they contained articles which mentioned the Thai royals and lese majeste cases.

Paris-based media freedom watchdog Reporters Without Borders says Thailand has more than 14 million Internet users and ruled that Thailand was the "new enemy of the Internet".

The communications ministry, meanwhile, has announced it is setting up a "war room" to police the Internet, claiming that thousands more web pages insult the monarchy and therefore threaten national security.