CANBERRA: Facebook is under pressure in Australia to take down a page that insults Aborigines. The government is accusing the social networking company of using its U.S. base to avoid Australian anti-discrimination laws.

The Aboriginal Memes Facebook page has created a furor in Australia this week with its depictions of indigenous Australians as drunks and welfare cheats.

Communications Minister Stephen Conroy told Australian Broadcasting Corp. late Wednesday his office had called on Facebook's Sydney office to take the page down.

Conroy says the creator of the page, whom he believed is a 16-year-old Australian living in the west coast city of Perth, was getting around Australian anti-discrimination laws through U.S. guarantees of free speech.

Facebook did not comment on Thursday.