[bestbits] IG on the 24th HRC session

[Valeria Betancourt]

Hi Parminder,

First, I would like to thank you for taking the time to go over our  
statement and sharing your thoughts on that.  I would like to thank  
you in particular for noting the call out of Pakistan government's  
human rights performance. We have done that in the past and will  
continue raising those concerns.  And we have also done it in relation  
to US violations of human rights:
https://www.apc.org/en/news/us-based-surveillance-and-data-collection-new-un-r
http://bestbits.net/prism-nsa/

In relation to Pakistan's statement (on behalf of a group of  
countries) it is important to note that we welcomed it, not denounce it.

What we would have liked to see however, was more commitment from  
those governments  - most of whom have long established histories of  
violating their citizens' privacy rights -  to transparency and to  
changing their own practices. It felt as if they were simply using the  
opportunity of the US's poor behaviour to put their enhanced  
cooperation agenda on the table, rather than really engaging the human  
rights topic under discussion in a substantial way.

An overview of our thinking in relation to enhanced cooperation,  
multistakeholder participation and internet governance is reflected in  
our submission to the CSTD WGEC:
http://www.apc.org/en/pubs/response-apc-cstd-working-group-enhanced-cooperati

We would appreciate your comments on our submission to the WGEC so we  
can discuss them further in Bali.

Looking forward to discuss these topics in person,

Valeria

On 05/10/2013, at 6:51, parminder wrote:

>
> On Wednesday 02 October 2013 07:35 PM, Valeria Betancourt wrote:
>> Dear all,
>>
>> A brief response from Bytes for All, Pakistan and APC on the  
>> intervention by Pakistan at the HRC24.
>> http://www.apc.org/en/node/18573
>
> Hi Valeria
>
> You rightly observed in your earlier email that this is the first  
> time a set of countries have raised the NSA surveillance issue in  
> the HRC. (And APC has long advocated that HRC is the right place for  
> many if not most global IG issues.) In the circumstances, such a  
> harsh response to the concerned statement against NSA snooping is  
> quite surprising.
>
> Well, as an aside, one can be opportunistic  on the occasion of such  
> pious statements to point towards the domestic HR record of the  
> complaining countries. Fair enough... (Although we fail to say such  
> things when US makes pious statement in favour of  
> multistakeholderism, transparency etc, not immediately pointing to  
> TPP, ACTA, and other venues of global IG in which US is such a key  
> player, and their entire lack of transparency or MSism. We should  
> just be consistent. At Baku, for instance, several civil society  
> actors sat on numerous panels where US mouthed things about MSism,  
> transparency etc, without murmuring a word about US' record in other  
> IG spaces, and at home. Why this partial treatment to the US?).
>
> What I find quite surprising is the concern expressed in the APC  
> statement against the call for "development of an international  
> mechanism in the context of ‘Enhanced cooperation’ within the WSIS  
> Tunis Agenda can be a concrete way forward", when APC had joined  
> others to roundly applaud President of Brazil's recent UN statement  
> which inter alia calls for "establishment of a civilian multilateral  
> framework for the governance and use of the Internet".
>
> If there is any essential difference between the two calls, I missed  
> it, and am happy to be enlightened.
>
> The APC statement decries - "The imposition of a new global internet  
> policy framework determined and agreed by governments – and  
> therefore being a top down and central mechanism – contradicts the  
> bottom-up multi-stakeholder principles of policy making, as well as  
> the end to end principles of internet architecture that are  
> essential to a free and open internet. "
>
> Well, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights is a framework  
> determined and agreed by governments.... Whereas, all proposals for  
> a new global IG framework do seem to come with much much more  
> participative avenues then were available when UDHR came about....
>
> APC statement says " creating a new UN body to focus on internet  
> policy will not be sustainable, or effective. The internet touches  
> on so many issues that no single policy space could ever effectively  
> deal with them all."
>
> Wonder then what is  the logic of creating a single policy- 
> participation space (which btw now wants to be much more than that)  
> for global IG in the form of IGF..... How is it that the logic that  
> works for creating an integral single Internet policy space like the  
> IGF fails for other levels of Internet policy making processes... I  
> could not understand this. Would like a clarification. Also, any  
> effort to develop a new Internet policy space is to look at issues  
> that do not have a home at present (clearly recognised in the Tunis  
> agenda and the recent BestBits statement on EC) and to coordinated  
> Internet-relevant work of other agencies. No one is proposing that  
> any issue that but touches the Internet (today, most issues do)  
> should be withdrawn from all relevant agencies and given to the  
> proposed new body. This is a complete mis- representation of any  
> such proposal from any developing country.
>
> And then, the recommendation is "Bytes for All, Pakistan and APC  
> believe that a distributed governance with concrete and effective  
> multi-stakeholder mechanisms of participation in decision making is  
> a way with great potential for strengthening an open and free  
> internet."
>
> This recommendation will be useful if we knew what exactly is the  
> referred distributed governance system. And before we get on to this  
> discussion can we please agree to discuss technical/ logical  
> governance issues (ICANN plus system) as different from larger  
> social, economic, political and cultural public policy issues, as  
> was agreed by the BestBits statement on Enhanced Cooperation to  
> which APC signed....
>
> I really have nothing to say about the distributed systems of  
> technical governance - meaning ICANN plus system. Lets accept it as  
> it is. Lets talk about other global IG issues, the present HRC  
> statement also being in such a regard.
>
> My main question in that respect is; what does APC/ Bytes consider  
> as a distributed governance system in terms of these larger public  
> policy issues pertaining to the global governance of the Internet?  
> Is APC proposing a new system(s) of this kind - in which case we  
> will like to know what does it look like?
>
> Or is APC pointing to some existing systems? Is is about the OECD,  
> TPP, ACTA, Cyberspace conference series, etc, kind of global IG  
> systems that it calls as a distributed system? If not, which ones?
>
> If we knew more about the preferred model of distributed governance  
> of the Internet recommended by APC/Bytes, we will be able to discuss  
> it here. (But, no ICANN here please, we already agreed to agree on  
> that system, as it is, and for the tasks it accomplishes.)
>
>
> Thanks.
>
> parminder
>
>
>>
>> Best,
>>
>> Valeria
>>
>>
>> On 20/09/2013, at 14:07, William Drake wrote:
>>
>>> Hi Robert
>>>
>>> You didn't see the text circulated here the other day proposing an  
>>> intergovernmental declaration on harmony?
>>>
>>> Apparently it was quickly withdrawn (there may be an interesting  
>>> story here) and there will now be a meeting summary doc instead.
>>>
>>> Bill
>>>
>>> On Sep 20, 2013, at 7:35 PM, Robert Guerra  
>>> <rguerra at privaterra.org> wrote:
>>>
>>>> Interesting Indonesia joined pack of like minded countries. Will  
>>>> be interesting if they try to advance a document or statement at  
>>>> the high level meeting in Bali.
>>>>
>>>> Robert
>>>> -- 
>>>> R. Guerra
>>>> Phone/Cell: +1 202-905-2081
>>>> Twitter: twitter.com/netfreedom
>>>> Email: rguerra at privaterra.org
>>>>
>>>> On 2013-09-20, at 11:39 AM, Valeria Betancourt wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> Dear all,
>>>>>
>>>>> Sharing this information with you all.
>>>>>
>>>>> Pakistan, speaking on behalf of Cuba, Venezuela, Zimbabwe,  
>>>>> Uganda, Ecuador, Russia, Indonesia, Bolivia, Iran, and China,  
>>>>> highlighted at HRC24 the need to protect the right to privacy as  
>>>>> an essential element of free expression, citing the  
>>>>> International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) and  
>>>>> La Rue’s report. The statement explicitly criticized the role of  
>>>>> major international internet and telecommunication technology  
>>>>> companies in violating privacy. It also explicitly made the  
>>>>> links between the allegations of mass state surveillance and the  
>>>>> need for reforming global internet governance. To quote the  
>>>>> statement directly:
>>>>>
>>>>> "The existing mechanisms like the Internet Governance Forum  
>>>>> established under paragraph 72 of the World Summit on  
>>>>> Information Society- Tunis Agenda have not been able to deliver  
>>>>> the desired results. A strategic rethinking of the global  
>>>>> internet governance mechanism is inevitable. Further development  
>>>>> of an international mechanism in the context of ‘Enhanced  
>>>>> cooperation’ within the WSIS Tunis Agenda can be a concrete way  
>>>>> forward. However we will need to be sincere in our efforts to  
>>>>> ensure a transparent, free, fair and respectful international  
>>>>> intergovernmental mechanism of internet governance and one that  
>>>>> also ensures the right to privacy."
>>>>>
>>>>> The full intervention by Pakistan is available at http://www.apc.org/en/system/files/HRC24_Pakistan_20130919.pdf
>>>>>
>>>>> Best,
>>>>>
>>>>> Valeria
>>>>
>>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>




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