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What basis do you have to state this supposed "fact"? Last year UNESCO strongly warned about Internet filtering, and in the same year the UN Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Expression has did the same. There is no need for control to be moved to the UN in order to restrict access to content. Countries around the world are doing a fine job of that on their own (and not just the most repressive ones - France, Germany, South Korea and others are amongst them). The only reason to move an issue to the UN is because it has border-crossing implications. National censorship or content regulation policies generally don't.

So saying "The Russian government is wrong on this issue" could be considered an attack. Maybe that is taking it to the extreme, but what if it's "The Russian government is wrong and the Russian people shouldn't stand for it". And then there is the slightly more blunt "...and the Russian people should rise up against it". So at what point does that become aggression? I ask in all honesty, I feel like this could have a major chilling effect on negotiations between nations where legitimate arguments could be construed as aggression.

Yes, and the UN is also contemplating a ban on Defamation of Religion.

Sadly ever ass-hat oppressive regime who doesn't like to be criticized, and every stupid idiot who believes in the tooth fairy wants to remove my right to criticize them or point out that they're idiots. People who embrace living in the stone age want to make it illegal for me to say that they're stupid for doing so.

So, allow me to preemptively say ... your country sucks if it takes away people's freedoms, your religion sucks if it confers an obligation on those of us who don't believe, your government sucks ... well, your government probably sucks no matter where you are. I retain my right to give offense, and if you don't like it, too damned bad.

Any religion or government which can't stand some criticism should be banned.

I'm all for the UN, but increasingly the backwards and the stupid are pushing an agenda that wants to wipe out the last thousand years of progress in human endeavors.

Actually, I had two facts mixed up in my head.

1) China executes computer-using criminals (media reported as hackers) who embezzled money:
http://www.swiss.ai.mit.edu/6095/student-papers/fa ll97-papers/kim-crime.html (search for "Shi Biao", or just Google "hacker Shi Biao")

2) China treats those who bypass its censorship harshly:
http://www.ifex.org/en/content/view/full/147/

Somewhere I got the idea that the "hackers" were executed for bypassing the Great Firewall. My mistake. However, China -does- punish those who bypass its censorship controls and thus I think my original point remains valid; anyone that receives lists of proxy servers is in danger of being harassed by the government for it.

Actually the censor and two other journalists were fired.

"These three journalists are innocent victims twice over," the worldwide press freedom organisation said. "They let through this ad [commemorating the Tiananmen Square massacre], because one of their staff didn't know what happened on 4 June 1989, so relentless is censorship about this episode."

What's wrong is that the premises make it a waste of money.

"software that would let the government monitor negative opinions of the United States or its leaders in newspapers and other publications overseas.

Such a 'sentiment analysis' is intended to identify potential threats to the nation"

Intelligence gathering is wasted if the audience doesn't know the difference between negative opinions and threats.

It's also creepy if the people running it have been known to drop bombs on news outlet offices, allegedly plan to bomb a TV station's headquarteres, launch an air strike on their office and kill their bureau chief, and shell a Reuters office with a tank.

It matters not whether bloggers are journalists. Judges can compel journalists (or "journalists") to reveal their sources for a variety of reasons, most pertinent being if a crime has been committed, gathering evidence for a civil trial or any other reason for which a judge decides to subpoena a journalist.

Journalists' sources are, of course, *not* protected when laws have been broken, as seen in these
cases. The obstructing journalists in question weren't protected, either.

You mean, a New York Times reporter like Judith Miller whose looking at jail time if she doesn't reveal the name of a source?