By Kieren McCarthy in Tunis for The Register
This article has been reproduced from The Register, with
permission.
Swiss president Samuel Schmid drew huge applause from the back
of the room when he directly criticised Tunisia’s controlling
Internet policies. "It is unsupportable that the UN still has
members that imprison their own citizens because of what they have
written on the Internet or in the press," he said. "Everyone should
be able to express their views freely."
Ben Ali shifted uncomfortably in his chair and refused to look
at Schmid when he sat down next to him after finishing his speech.
However, Schmid’s speech was followed up by even more direct
criticism from Shirin Abadi from the International Federation for
Human Rights.
"Certain governments that are not genuinely elected by their
people do not reflect the people’s desire on Internet matters," she
said. "It is important to make sure that non-governmental
organisations are not manipulated by creating so-called NGOs that
transmit false information on the situation prevailing in their
country."
That was a direct reference to a diplomatic incident that
happened in Tunis on Monday, when Tunisian police forcibly
prevented local and international human rights organisations from
meeting to organise an alternative "Citizen Summit". The German
ambassador to the UN became involved, as did several World Summit
participants who have immunity in Tunisia while the Summit
continues. The trouble sparked an official EU complaint to the
Tunisian foreign ministry yesterday afternoon.
Ms Abadi went to slam countries that "suppress an author that
expresses any criticism of their government" to which Ben
Ali, acting as chair of the ceremony, shook his head.
The extraordinarily frank criticism followed Ben Ali’s own
opening speech to the Summit in which he spoke at some length about
his view of the Internet. Its content clearly irritated the other
speakers.
"We look forward to the adoption of practical decisions and
proposals to solve the questions put forth by the information
society," he said, before continuing: "These last few years have
witnessed the emergence of some types of use that shake call into
question the credibility of information. Some arouse racism,
hatred, terrorism. Others disseminate allegations and
falsehoods."
He went on to describe how society would have to make
individuals "commit to responsible use" of the Net, and how it was
necessary to "set ethical standards". The current culture of the
Internet, he argued, was not a true representation of the world’s
people as a whole and how there was a "collective moral
responsibility" to change this. He then outlined how Tunisia was
"enlarging the scope of individual freedom."
UN secretary-general Kofi Annan’s address was less directly
critical but nevertheless made a strong statement. Freedom, he
said, was "the information society’s lifeblood". He continued: "It
is freedom that enables citizens everywhere to benefit from
knowledge, for journalists to do their essential work, and citizens
to hold government accountable".
A few hours later, he told a press conference that he has
personally spoken to President Ben Ali about the problems with
human rights and press freedom in Tunisia, and he answered
questions by journalists about the practice of Tunisia to block
websites and control access directly.
"It is one thing to establish standards and another to achieve
them," Annan said, before adding that by having the conference in
Tunisia it had in fact "put a spotlight on the issues here".
Suddenly it seemed that rather than the UN being wrong for
hosting the event in Tunisia, it was Tunisia that had most to lose
from the deal.
© The Register
2005
