AI takes on net repression

SAYING the Internet is “a new frontier in the struggle for human rights,” Amnesty International (AI) has initiated a campaign against governments that attempt to repress online freedoms, as well as corporations that aid them in doing so.

“The web is a great tool for sharing ideas and freedom of expression,” AI said yesterday, as it launched Irrepressible.info, an online campaign to gather pledges against the repression of dissent through the web.

“However, efforts to try and control the Internet are growing. People are persecuted and imprisoned simply for criticising their government, calling for democracy and greater press freedom or exposing human rights abuses, online,” said the group, which is celebrating its 45th anniversary with the new campaign.

The campaign, AI says, aims to call attention to the various ways that the freedom to use the net is limited by governments.

The pledges that will be gathered will be presented at the United Nations conference, on the future of the Internet, set for November this year.

This blog has reported, for instance, on the blocking of websites in Pakistan as a result of the controversy surrounding cartoons illustrating the Prophet Muhammed.

AI says there is a growing number of incidents in which those who have turned to the net to discuss or protest about official government policies have been jailed for what they said.

AI refers to the case of 37-year-old Chinese journalist, Shi Tao, who is serving a 10-year jail sentence for sending an e-mail overseas which detailed the restrictions the Chinese government wanted to impose on papers writing about the 15th anniversary of the massacre in Tiananmen Square.

Reporters Without Borders, studying the text of the verdict in the journalist’s case, said that Internet giant, Yahoo!, helped identify the journalist through his e-mail account.

BBC News has quoted a Yahoo spokesperson as saying that the company, “just like any other global company,” merely wanted to ensure that its local country offices are operating “within the laws, regulations and customs of the country in which they are based.”

But AI maintains that the Internet should be “a force for political freedom, not repression.”

“People have the right to seek and receive information and to express their peaceful beliefs online without fear or interference,” the pledge reads, calling “on governments to stop the unwarranted restriction of freedom of expression on the Internet, and on companies to stop helping them do it.”

(Visit the blog of the “Free Expression in Asian Cyberspace: A Conference of Asian Bloggers, Podcasters and Online Media,” a meeting in Manila of Asian bloggers, podcasters, and independent online news providers in April, organized by the Southeast Asian Press Alliance and PCIJ. In that conference, issues related to online freedoms were discussed as well.)