“Cyberspace is similar to the real world in that both freedom and order are necessary”, he said.
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Lu has previously advanced a “multilateral” approach to global Internet governance that focuses on “the state making the rules based on the idea of the sovereignty of the nation-state representing its citizens”. He said that China manages the Internet, as does every country’s government.
Li Xiaodong, director of the China Internet Network Information Center, an organization responsible for allocating online resources such as website domains, said that as long as China’s online data is well protected, its Internet market is wide open to the world.
The BBC’s John Sudworth, who is at the conference, says the keynote speech by President Xi is a clear sign that internet security and control have been elevated to national priorities.
Xi, whose government operates extensive Internet monitoring and censorship, spoke at a conference Wednesday attended by executives of major global and Chinese online companies. Xi is reported to have said that countries should step up communication, broaden consensus, and deepen cooperation between one another.
Chinese authorities have attached more importance to the Internet, pledging to transform China from a big Internet nation to a great one. The Chinese government has launched a campaign to eradicate the influence of what it calls “hostile Western values”, and China’s military newspaper this year described the internet as a core battleground for forces seeking to undermine the ruling Communist Party by influencing young Chinese people.
With around 670 million users and over 4.13 million websites in China, the Internet and economic and social development have become intrinsically linked. At the first such gathering a year ago, efforts to issues a declaration broke down after some from the worldwide technology community balked at language calling on them to “respect Internet sovereignty of all countries” and “widely spread positive energy”. Pakistani President Mamnoon Hussain and Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev, as well as political leaders from the former Soviet republics of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan were all expected to attend.
The Cyberspace Administration, which was set up in May 2011 under the State Council, China’s Cabinet, has also taken on a higher profile, with a crackdown in 2013 on prominent netizens on the Twitter-like Weibo microblog site.
The speech was the latest of example of Xi’s efforts to elevate Internet policy to a top-level concern.
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“After the [exposure] of the US 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”, it said.
