Highlights: Today's China Internet Hearings

Thanks from Chinese and Americans who care about freedom and democracy is amply due to Congressman Chris Smith, Chair of the House International Relations Subcommittee, Africa, Global Human Rights and international Operations.

Similar thanks are also due to Rebecca MacKinnon, whose live-blog posts today are an exemplar of reporting skills. CNN’s loss of this correspondent is the Internet’s gain.

Rebecca was not able to stay through the entire proceedings due to a prior commitment, so I will just fill in from the prepared statements those she missed. For Chair Smith’s and Rep. Lantos’ opening comments, go here.

Lantos’ comments deserve repetition: “Your abhorrent activities in China are a disgrace. I simply do not understand how your corporate leadership sleeps at night…. These companies tell us that they will change China. But China has already changed them.”

For Google’s defense, go here.

For Yahoo’s defense, go here.

MacKinnon’s comment, “Passing the buck?? Sounds like it to me...” seems apropos to all the tech testifiers.

For Microsoft’s defense, go here.

For Cisco’s defense, go here.

As the New York Times reported: “the statements alone provided some of the most extensive and candid airing of the companies' positions on the China issue since concerns began mounting among critics well over a year ago.”

The NYT’s report continues:

And as questions were raised after each new revelation, companies like Yahoo, Google, Microsoft and Cisco Systems invariably offered a variation on a common chorus.
"Just like any other global company," as Mary Osako, a Yahoo spokeswoman, put it in September, "Yahoo must ensure that its local country sites operate within the laws, regulations and customs of the country in which they are based."
The subcommittee's chairman, Representative Christopher H. Smith, plans to introduce legislation by week's end that would restrict an Internet company's ability to censor or filter basic political or religious terms — even if that puts the company at odds with local laws in the countries where it now operates.

MacKinnon summarizes the draft legislation here.

It appears restrained and reasonable. Let’s hope it is not too diluted by other legislators, and if any try they are awarded Royal Order of the Bootlicker.

Now, on to highlights from the testimony of various human rights leaders. All these statement deserve complete reading.

Xiao Quiang, Director, China Internet Project, Graduate School of Journalism, University of California at Berkeley:

“In the last century, we witnessed numerous atrocities and destruction, but also the prevailing tide of human solidarity in the struggle for freedom….Today, a similar struggle is unfolding over the Internet, including in countries such as my homeland, China…American corporations have an opportunity to be on the right side of history.”

Sharon Hom, Executive Director, Human Rights in China:

“Vague, abstract, inaccurate reference to ‘Chinese law’ and compliance with domestic law is an indefensible justification for undermining human rights. The obligations of companies need to be viewed in light of a coherent framework of the legal and ethical obligations of IT companies that includes the laws of the home country, the host foreign country, and the larger framework of international human rights responsibilities of transnational companies.”

Yom offers the example of China’s negotiated agreement to World Trade Organization requirements. Yom, also, wonders what will happen to the security technology sold to China for hosting the 2008 Olympics. Good question. Needs answers.

Harry Wu, Publisher, China Information Center:

“The PRC’s Ministry of Public Security has been continually upgrading and expanding its $800 million ‘Golden Shield’ project…China has also used the ‘Golden Shield’ as a way of monitoring Chinese civilians. The project will help prolong Communist rule…The ‘Golden Shield Project’ would not have been possible without the technology and equipment from these companies….nearly all of China has been employing Cisco’s surveillance technology…[which] guarantees speech recognition, automated surveillance of telephone conversations, integration of biometric data, wireless Internet access to track individual users, video surveillance data from remote cameras…, etc.”

Libby Liu, President, Radio Free Asia:

“More complete information, and greater exposure to competing political viewpoints, help ensure that populations in closed societies are more likely to approach the outside world, including the United states, with an open mind….When Chinese readers go online, they do so under surveillance and often at great risk to themselves and their families."

Lucie Morillon, Washington Representative, Reporters Without Borders:

“China ranks 159th out of the 167 countries in the World Press Freedom index…Chinese authorities have managed to gradually shut down this ‘open window’ [the Internet] to the world….[U.S. tech companies] By collaborating with repressive regimes’ censorship policies, they are helping to create country-specific access to multiple versions of the Internet. They are putting borders on this universal arena of communication that the Internet was intended to be….Internet censorship in China subverts US diplomacy efforts to promote democracy in the world….Aside from Google, all of the companies we approached refused to enter into a dialog on this subject….Thanks to the media and Congressional attention to these issues, some of these companies are starting to consider the consequences of their activities in repressive regimes.”

Congressman James Leach, Chair of the House Subcommittee on Asia & the Pacific, joined Congressman Smith.

“It is difficult to see how altering one’s search engine to exclude politically sensitive materials is anything other than voluntary cooperation in censorship by Chinese authorities….To the extent that a company facilitates efforts by Chinese authorities to restrict such websites, that company undercuts our government’s efforts to promote freedom of information….It is presently impossible to gauge the leverage that American companies possess inside China because many of the limitations they observe are self-imposed…Citizens of China are willing to risk jail for freedom of expression when certain American companies are unwilling to risk profits for the same principle.”