UN Officials Remove Poster Mentioning Chinese Firewall

At a UN-sponsored Internet Governance Forum in Egypt, anti-censorship group Open Net Initiative was startled by a demand from UN officials to remove a poster mentioning Chinese Net censorship. When ONI refused the request, security personnel arrived and took away the poster. The group was promoting a new book, Access Controlled, a survey of Internet censorship, filtering, and online surveillance. A witness said, "The poster was thrown on the floor and we were told to remove it because of the reference to China and Tibet. We refused, and security guards came and removed it. The incident was witnessed by many." Here is a video of the removal.

Comments

U.N. and Human Rights...

[SuperKendall]

Anyone who thinks the U.N. exists in any way to help with human rights is insane. All you have to do is look at the list of nations on the U.S. Human Rights panel...

The U.N. exists to exert and expand U.N. control, wherever possible (just like any large organization, government or otherwise). Helping people is at best a secondary motive and sometimes not even not even a motive at all.

Re:U.N. and Human Rights...

[Jeremy Erwin]

Sure. The "true" Chinese government is based in Tapei, and they don't have a UN presence.

Yes, thankfully

[SuperKendall]

If it exists to exert and expand UN control, it's doing an utterly terrible job of it.

We are all lucky that the natural state of bureaucrats is one of ineptness.

But the U.N. is doing a lot more behind the scenes than you realize, the recent inter-nation secret copyright treaty is one facet of that... people here care a lot about copyright issues which is why you know about it, but how many OTHER similar secret multi-national treaties are being drafted that you and I know nothing about?

Re:Yes, thankfully

[sapphire wyvern]

As I understand, ACTA is being negotiated directly between representatives of the various countries. The UN, as an entity, is not involved, although obviously the states involved in ACTA are all member states of the UN as well.

was witnessed by many

[nurb432]

Prove it.

No, i wasn't kidding. One of the dangers of having governmental entities in control of information, and most of it being recorded only digitally: "facts" are a variable commodity.

Which UN policy did the poster contravene?

[ExRex]

That's not made clear in the article.
Also, it was very odd the way everyone stood around the poster on the floor, not touching it or picking it up, as though it were a diseased, dead body which no one was willing to touch. So they called the police to come an take it away.
Why didn't the folks promoting the book just stand it up again, I wonder?

Re:It's good to be owed money!

[0123456]

Yep! Now who's the Super Power, again?

The US government prints pieces of paper which Americans send to China. The Chinese make actual useful stuff and send it to America in return. Americans end up with a pile of useful stuff, Chinese end up with a pile of pieces of paper.

Who's getting the worst of the deal here?

Re:Censorship depends on the country.

[stephanruby]

In Germany and France, freedom of speech is a basic human right. Anyone -- citizen and non-citizen -- in Germany and France is entitled to freedom of speech.

Are you freaking kidding me? In France, you can't even wear a small catholic cross around your neck to a public school, unless it's well hidden under your shirt. And in both France and Germany, books like "Mein Kampf" and so-called nazi paraphernalia are banned (not that this does any good mind you, it only makes the extreme right feel more victimized and it drove that kind of market for that stuff underground).

And in France at least, there is an unspoken understanding between the press and the government. You don't say anything to embarrass government officials, and you get to keep your job. In France, the government has so much influence over every area of life, it make life very difficult if any of its citizen gets out of line. By the way, I know this because I'm French, I was born in France, and I've lived part of my life in France.

Re:Censorship depends on the country.

[jacksonj04]

I'm actually quite impressed with the French approach to religion in public. Either everybody can show their religion freely, or nobody can. Compare and contrast with the UK, where there have been instances of nurses being told to remove any and all religious symbology... oh, unless you're muslim, in which case headscarves are fine. Oh, and jews are cool with the skullcap. Whilst we're at it, sikhs can all wear turbans. In fact, just take off any christian symbols.