“We should respect the right of individual countries to independently choose their own path of cyber development and model of cyber regulation and participate in global cyberspace governance on an equal footing”, he said.
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Xi made the remarks at the opening ceremony of the Second World Internet Conference (WIC) in China’s Zhejiang province, Xinhau reported. “No country should pursue cyber hegemony, interfere in other countries’ internal affairs or engage in, connive at or support cyber activities that undermine other countries’ national security”.
Pu went on trial in Beijing on Monday in what campaigners described as a landmark freedom of speech case that will help define what can and cannot be said on the Chinese internet in future.
China has also more frequently attacked the use of virtual proxy network (VPN) software, which is widely used by expatriates, foreign businesses, and many tech-savvy Chinese to circumvent the Great Firewall.
Since Xi took China’s helm in early 2013, he has presided over a centralisation of domestic Internet governance and broader efforts to control, and often censor, the flow of information online, experts say. Xi appealed to attendees at the conference, saying that cyberspace should “not be a battlefield”.
Nonetheless companies such as LinkedIn have agreed to censor their content in exchange for access to the country, while Facebook and other banned companies have lined up to offer the hand of friendship to China’s top leaders.
Beijing has also been accused of launching cyberattacks against companies and governments in recent years.
“Under the guise of sovereignty and security, the Chinese authorities are trying to rewrite the rules of the Internet so censorship and surveillance become the norm everywhere, ” Roseann Rife, Amnesty’s Hong Kong-based East Asia research director, said in a statement. Foreign diplomats say such a declaration was put under their hotel room doors on the last night of the conference previous year, but they refused to sign it. “As long as China’s laws are respected, we warmly welcome companies and entrepreneurs from all countries to invest in China”.
Cyberspace must be governed, operated and used in accordance with the law so that the internet can enjoy sound development under the rule of law’.
At this year’s conference in Wuzhen, Zhejiang province, at least one journalist from the New York Times said he had not been allowed to attend, and while some global media were present, others said they had been told last week that it was too late to register. “We can not just have the security of one or some countries while leaving the rest insecure; still less should one seek the so-called absolute security for oneself at the expense of the security of others”, he said.
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Prime ministers Dmitry Medvedev of Russian Federation and Karim Massimov of Kazakhstan, whose nations are members of the regional Shanghai Co-operation Organisation, also were there.
