Speaking to an global audience at the kick-off of China’s second-annual World Internet Conference on Wednesday, Mr Xi promoted China’s vision for what it calls internet sovereignty, meaning that others should respect a country’s right to regulate online activity as it sees fit.
Advertisement
Addressing the opening ceremony of Second World Internet Conference attended by executives of global and Chinese cyber companies, Xi lashed out at “double standards” in safeguarding cyber security and called for governments to cooperate in regulating Internet use.
China’s President Xi Jinping has called on states to honor one another’s “cyber sovereignty” and distinct net government models. He said: “We should never seek internet hegemony, [or] interfere in other nations’ internal affairs”, and added that the web should not “become a battlefield of countries struggling against each other”. To promote equity and justice, Xi proposed building an Internet governance system which features a multilateral approach with multi-party participation.
“There has been no worldwide cyberspace governance and China is emphasising [the need] to create one because it affects its core interests”, Professor He Qisong at the Shanghai University of Political Science and Law said.
Some Western media or tech firms are not allowed in China because they are not willing to abide by Chinese laws.
China’s top internet official, Lu Wei, said last week at a preview event for the conference that foreigners who made money out of China but were hostile to the country were “not welcome”.
China continues to be criticised for the hard-and-fast net regulations where it censors posts and blocks important websites.
Xi however said that there is a need for a balance between “order” and freedom of expression.
UNITED NATIONS, Dec. 14 (APP): Calling the Paris Agreement on climate change ‘a health insurance policy for the planet, ‘ United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said Monday he never lost faith over his nine years in office that the worldwide community could rise to the challenge and take steps to curb emission and boost climate-resilient growth. “This is an all-out assault on Internet freedoms”, said Roseann Rife, the East Asia research director at Amnesty International.
After the out of the U.S National Security Agency’s PRISM program, more countries have woken up to the fact that “absolute Internet freedom” touted by the US will only end up as “absolute security” in Washington and “absolute insecurity” for the rest.
Xi’s government has even tightened controls since he came to power in 2013, operating an extensive Internet monitoring and censorship program dubbed overseas as the “Great Firewall”.
Advertisement
Xi made the remarks while visiting an expo, themed “Light of the Internet”, displaying the latest Internet technologies and products in China and overseas.
