America Online, the world's biggest Internet service provider with 15 million subscribers, has faced new charges of racism and discrimination after users were notified that Irish language postswere banned from an AOL message board.

Dozens of Irish-related discussion forums were shut down earlier this month "for evaluation", prompting accusations of political censorship by angry AOL users.

While some forums have re-appeared, Irish language speakers have now complained that a message board where users swap opinions on the "Peace in Ireland" forum recently carried a notice banning messages in the island's native tongue.

The notice read: "This board is designed for English speakers and Gaelic postings are not allowed. Continuation of this type of posting will result in a warning to the account."

The note later added that "posts in Gaelic will be removed without further recourse to the person who posted it".

One enthusiast said the move amounted to "banning people from expressing themselves in what may be their native language".

AOL later insisted it did not oppose Irish as a matter of policy. A company spokeswoman explained the action had been taken because of the possibility of messages which could not be understood by the system administrators. It is currently recruiting an Irish language expert to monitor Irish Gaelic posts for any "inappropriate" messages.

* AOL subscribers are invited to post at the Republican Bulletin Board: visit http://irlnet.com/forum/rmlist/ on the web