Give a rat a cookie and it'll ask for a glass of milk. As if the
UN's gun control agenda wasn't bad enough ( they want a worldwide
ban on civilian gun ownership! ), now they want to stop free
speech too!
http://tinyurl.com/9hb7p
CNET News.com http://www.news.com/
Cuba, Iran lash out at Internet freedom
By Declan McCullagh
Story last modified Fri Nov 18 05:57:00 PST 2005
TUNIS, Tunisia--Cuba, Iran and African
governments lashed out at the U.S. government
this week, charging that the Internet permits too
much free speech and that the way it is managed
must be reformed immediately.
The U.S. and other Western nations "insist on
being world policemen on the management of the
Internet," Zimbabwe President Robert Mugabe, who
has been the country's leader since 1987, said at
a United Nations information society summit here.
"Those who have supported nihilistic and
disorderly freedom of expression are beginning to
see the fruits" of their efforts, Mugabe said,
adding that Zimbabwe will be "challenging the
bully-boy mentality that has driven the unipolar
world."
These criticisms demonstrate that a detente
reached at the World Summit on the Information
Society (WSIS) on domain name management has
hardly resolved long-running disputes about
Internet management, the primacy of the English
language online, and the so-called digital divide
between nations with functioning economies and
those with dysfunctional ones. The deal resulted
in the creation of a U.N. Internet Governance
Forum expected to meet in Greece in 2006.
"Fidel Castro, the unflinching promoter of the
use of new technologies," believes "it is
necessary to create a multinational democratic
(institution) which administers this network of
networks," said the WSIS delegate from Cuba.
In Cuba, only people with government permission
can access the Internet, owning computer
equipment is prohibited, and online writers have
been imprisoned, according to Reporters Without
Borders, a Paris-based free speech watchdog group.
Too often, the Internet is used for the
"propagation of falsehoods," said Mohammad
Soleymani, Iran's minister of communication and
information technology.
Soleymani called for the elimination of the
California-based Internet Corporation for
Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN)--which
approves new top-level domain names--in favor of
United Nations control.
"Changing the current Internet governance to a
participatory, legitimate and accountable system
under an international authority is imperative,"
he said.
But changes proposed by Third World countries
that would give them more influence are "being
rejected because they are not facilities managed
by the Breton Woods institution by the West's
neo-colonial desires," charged Zimbabwe's Mugabe,
referring to a post-World War II agreement that
led to the creation of the World Bank and the
International Monetary Fund.
Mozambique Prime Minister Luisa Diogo predicted
the struggles to replace ICANN were not over,
saying that "it is a matter of justice and
legitimacy that all people must have a say in the
way the Internet is governed." ICANN does have an
international board of directors, including
members from Senegal, Morocco, and Nairobi, but
critics say that's not enough.
A recurring criticism of the WSIS summit was that
wealthier nations had not done enough to help
poorer ones take advantage of the Internet.
"The proceeds have not been equally shared by
developing and developed countries," said Sudan
President Omar Ahmad al-Bashir. "The digital
divide is growing between the rich and the poor
countries."
Economists generally agree, however, that
investors prefer nations with a respect for
property rights, the rule of law and a
functioning court system--which means that few
African nations make the list.
The Heritage Foundation, a conservative think
tank, offers an Index of Economic Freedom. The
index finds a close correlation between wealth
and a stable, functioning government. Wealthy
regions like Hong Kong, the U.S., and Switzerland
respect economic rights, the index shows, while
poor nations like Sudan, Zimbabwe, Iran and Cuba
show the least respect for them.
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"It's time to get the U.S. out of the UN and the UN out of the
U.S."!!! http://groups.yahoo.com/group/UN-OUT/
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