22 Feb 11 | Events, United Kingdom
Index on Censorship Free Expression Award 2010 winners
The 11th annual Index on Censorship Freedom of Expression Awards honour those who, often at great personal risk, have given voice to issues and stories from around the globe that would otherwise have passed unnoticed.
This year’s event will be hosted by Jonathan Dimbleby at the Royal Institution in Mayfair on 24 March. It promises to be a truly inspiring evening, with a keynote address from Booker prize-winning novelist Howard Jacobson and a special address from celebrated playwright Sir Tom Stoppard.
Over four decades Index has worked for victims of oppression and censorship, championing their right to free expression. In December, when Natalia Koliada of the world-renowned Belarus Free Theatre was arrested and bundled into a police van, her first call for help on a smuggled mobile phone was to Index on Censorship. In Tunisia we’ve been working on the ground with civil society activists for five years. In addition to our international work, we lead the campaign to reform English libel law.
The awards, kindly sponsored by SAGE, gives you the opportunity to support our vital work. We expect over 300 prominent guests this year, and your attendance will fund our ongoing campaign for free expression in the UK and abroad. The event will begin at 7pm with a champagne reception and grand canapés. After the awards ceremony we will ask you to bid high in our celebrated auction.
Help us aid the courageous efforts of people who campaign for freedom of expression even in the most hostile environments by purchasing tickets below. Each ticket comes with a FREE SUBSCRIPTION to Index on Censorship’s award-winning magazine!
You can read about last year’s Index Award winners here
22 Feb 11 | Asia and Pacific, China
An appeal to replicate Tunisia’s “Jasmine Revolution” in 13 cities across China over the weekend has flopped spectacularly.
There was little sign of any demonstration, just huge crowds of police, journalists and onlookers at the proposed sites in Beijing and Shanghai.
A handful of people were arrested including a man who tried to take a photo of a jasmine flower with his mobile phone in Beijing, raising suspicions that the call to demonstrate was meant to be performance art.
The anonymous appeal first appeared on an overseas Chinese activist website and was then spread by Twitter (which is banned in China but widely accessed by dissidents via proxies but not by the general population).
Human rights campaigners said the call had prompted the authorities to question or detain scores of activists before the protests.
The Guardian reports that Liu Shihu, a human rights lawyer, was beaten and dumped on the roadside to prevent him taking part in the southern province of Guangdong.
Unlike the protests that have swept the Middle East over the past weeks, the call for revolution in China originated from overseas and there was a noticeable lack of popular support coming from inside the country.
From The Financial Times blog:
“Many ….onlookers at the Sunday protest… said they had no idea what the gathering was about. The explanation of a planned ‘Jasmine revolution’ in China drew a stare of disbelief on most of the young faces.”
This salient point was largely ignored by much of the western media, who preferred to blame the strict censorship and a heavy police presence for the failure of the protests.
“Police and Internet censors easily thwarted an anonymous online appeal for people to stage simultaneous antigovernment protests,” said The Wall Street Journal without citing evidence of popular support for such a protest in China.
Jeremiah Jenne, in the Atlantic, has wiser words:
“While it can be easy to sell a message of ‘Stick with us or face the consequences’ when you have near total control over the education, information, and media environments, it is still worth noting that an awful lot of people in China, especially in Beijing, buy into this.
So long as this is the case, and so long as there aren’t any events or causes which mobilize popular discontent across class lines or geographic distance, the chances of a revolution — of any flavour — in China will remain quite remote.”
Indeed, the failure of the protests gave state-employed columnists the chance to pour scorn on the protest organisers. The English-language Global Times ran an opinion piece which likened them to “beggars in the streets — they never fade away, while the rest of the country moves forward”.
Whether performance art or a genuine call for revolution, China’s “Jasmine Revolution” has only caused more trouble for activists in China — Liu says the beating fractured his leg — and tightened internet censorship.
16 Feb 11 | Iran, Middle East and North Africa
As a tribute to Saneh Jaleh, who two days ago lost his life in the fight for freedom of expression, I have translated a short story written by him.
Saneh Jaleh, a 26-year-old theatre student at Tehran’s Arts University was killed by the regime’s forces during demonstrations on Monday 14 February. The protests had been in support of the people of Egypt and Tunisia, celebrating their freedom of expression and will. Iranian citizens in Tehran, Shiraz, Esfahan, Mashad, Kermanshah and Rasht bravely took to the streets for the first time in more than a year with the slogans “Tunisia, Egypt, Iran” and “Mubarak, Ben Ali, now Seyed Ali [Ayatollah Khamenei]”. As night fell the regime’s Basij and security forces attacked the peaceful protestors, with their callous tactics as the scene descended into one of familiar horror.
I leave you with Jaleh’s fictional short story The Bus, originally written in Persian (see bottom of page) and published in Azma magazine.
The Bus
by Saneh Jaleh
Beside the young man is an old man with a cigarette. The third drag of the cigarette is over and the young man awaits the smoke. The old man lets the smoke out. The smoke enters the young man’s throat. He deliberately coughs gently but the old man doesn’t hear. The cigarette goes up and down and he flicks the ash on the floor of the bus, the young man’s eyes following the movements of the old man’s hand. The young man leaves the old man alone and stares out of the window.
The single seat has become free. It seems the lady sitting there had had second thoughts about the journey, or maybe she’s forgotten something, or maybe she could no longer stand the cigarette smoke. Either way, it’s the young man’s luck and he’s making the most of it, now two steps further from the smoke. He sits in the seat, glued to the window and feeling cold. His body relaxes into the seat and he closes his eyes. There’s a small smile on his lips, but it curls back the minute the sound of the engine is heard. His eyes are now open and he leans back normally.
He looks out of the window, following the slow, short steps of the lady. Her left hand is by her ear and she’s talking non-stop, not wanting to think about turning back or not turning back, but her happiness is complete in turning her gaze away from that place. He looks at the time. It’s exactly 2:35pm. Now to check the wallet. Only 50 Tomans. The taxi fare is exactly 50 Tomans. A smile. This smile reminds him of the old man’s smile and his own smile before getting on the bus. An old man whose appearance did not differ all that much from the old man on the bus but who spoke nothing of his conscience.
The bus is now in motion. The driver glances in the side-view mirrors and gently puts his foot on the accelerator. He watches the driver and the movement of his hand as he changes gear. The back of his head is more interesting. Thinning yellow hair that goes from the back of his neck to below the middle of his head. Because he has no hair in front, the young man thinks: “Ah, a calm, bald, driver.” The bus separates from the row of buses. The passengers look out of the window at the cement buildings at the crossroads, half yellow, half black. What a ridiculous colour scheme, they’re thinking to themselves. With that the bus stops. The driver quickly gets down. A few other free drivers join him as he releases the bonnet. They all look at the engine. The young man sees a number of heads bobbing up and down and occasionally to the side.
A familiar head emerges and opens the door, climbing back onto the bus. The young man can now see his face. He’s saying: “Dear passengers. The engine has cut. It won’t take long to fix. Of course we need to change one of the parts. This will only take half an hour, if you wait half an hour it will be fixed and we’ll get moving.” Laughter, or upset, or indifference are the traits he evokes in us. With half an hour to go, everyone quickly gets off to warm themselves with a hot tea or coffee. The old man draws a cigarette from his pack and calmly gets off the bus after everyone else. He’s probably thinking to himself that a cigarette in the cold air is more pleasurable, the young man thinks. He stays where he is, because he can’t be bothered, and because he has no money. He only pulls up the zipper of his jacket and stares out of the front windscreen of the bus. His eyes narrow, focusing on something that links to a bad feeling.
He chooses to revisit the story anew. He looks at his watch. The time is exactly 2:35pm. He says softly, the story will end in 25 minutes.
It was 1pm. He set off for the terminal in search of a friend or acquaintance. He only had 50 Tomans. That’s why he was looking for his friends. He needed at least 450 Tomans for the hire. He searched everyone he saw but could not see a friend among them. Having searched the whole terminal he could no longer bear to stand. Desolate, he sat in a chair at the far end of the terminal alongside the road, saying: “It’s better this way.” He stared at his shoes and stretched out his legs. His hands lay on his knees, just as something unexpected happens. Unbelievably, there is a 500 Toman note at his feet. He wants to believe it. The man’s heart begins to beat for a moment, but then more desolate than ever, he says to himself: “It’s better this way.” Hopeless he says: “Yes sir, go ahead.” The man replies: “You’ve dropped your money.” With a smile the young man says: “Where? Oh here it is, I found it.” “Thank you very much madam.” “You’re welcome.” And he hears the footsteps of a woman gradually fading. She is making her way to the buses. As she approaches she reaches into her bag and pulls out a ticket and presents it. As she gets on the bus, she disappears from the young man’s view. She’s probably sitting on the other side, he says to himself.
He puts the money in his wallet, uncomfortable but happy. Looking at the wallet in his hand he remembers the 1000 Toman notes he’d had. He asks himself: Was the old man telling the truth? He tells himself that it has nothing to do with him, that he fulfilled his duty. He recalls the old man’s smile, smiling. He checks the time. It’s 2pm. He wants to review last night’s events again. He gets up and goes into the bus terminal, finding a comfortable chair. It’s exactly five past two in the afternoon. The adventure will end in precisely 25 minutes, he says to himself softly.
It’s dark. Exactly 8pm. He dresses carefully, as always doing up the zipper on his jacket. He wipes his shoes with a hanky and calmly puts them on. He opens the door to leave, quietly closing it behind him. His nightly ritual of roaming the streets for one hour begins. It’s cold outside. He walks softly. He looks at others, but is lost in his own thoughts. The street is empty. A cold wind hits him. He loses himself in thought, like every other night. He doesn’t notice an old man joining him on one side. Maybe because he wasn’t expecting him. But the old man makes his presence felt. Before that there had been noone else on the street. With anxiety and disquiet he hurriedly says “My son, my son…my son has had an accident.” The young man hears only this sentence and stares at a folder and piece of paper that the old man is holding. On it is written: Urgent request for Blood group O. He looks back at the old man. It seems he has stopped talking. Realising this, the young man says “How can I help?”. The old man replies “I need 2,700 Tomans; the man with blood group O has said he won’t give any blood until he receives all the money.” Without hesitation, the young man reaches into his pocket. He hands over three 1000 Toman notes. The old man smiles brightly, saying “My son, I am indebted to you. Give me your number or address, or take my identity card.” He says the last sentence more slowly. But the young man has distanced himself from the old man and is once again walking soflty. Thirty, forty steps away, it occurs to him that the old man may not be telling the truth. He decides it has nothing to do with him, that he has done his duty.
He looks at the time. It is exactly 2:35pm. The bus is filling up. He walks towards it. There is only one free seat, next to an old man. The single seat opposite is occupied by a lady.
He looks at the time again now. It’s exactly 3 o’clock in the afternoon. The door opens and the passengers one by one return to their seats. The driver is seated behind the wheel. He puts his foot on the accelerator harder this time. the engine roars. The bus sets off with greater speed. The young man stares at the cement buildings, blocks of half yellow, half black. What a ridiculous colour scheme, he thinks to himself. Just then he sees a young man at the crossroads, walking slowly, head down; he may look for something, or he may not. With the end of that sentence, he closes his eyes.
The Bus by Saneh Jaleh
16 Feb 11 | Uncategorized
Secretary Clinton’s George Washington University speech can best be understood by comparing it to her internet freedom speech given, with great flourish, a little more than one year earlier.
The 2010 speech was given, primarily, with an eye on China. This speech was set in the wake of Tunisia and Egypt. The 2011 speech sought – nobly and romantically — to emphasize the human aspects — not the mere technological ones — of great public actions that could alter history.
This was a speech nominally about the internet, but Secretary Clinton again and again talked about the power of people massing and demonstrating, not because of technology but merely aided by it.
Brave individuals “stood and marched and chanted and the authorities tracked and blocked and arrested them. The internet did not do any of these things; people did.”
There was a modesty to the speech that refined the claims of its predecessor. The 2010 speech was on internet freedom (see my blog about it in the Huffington Post; the 2011 speech was on “Internet Rights and Wrongs: Choices and Challenges in Networked World.”)
Things were and should be stated in a more complicated way. The 2010 talk spoke about “one internet”, a challenge to notions of state sovereignty.
This trope, a specific challenge to China, was less marked in the 2011 presentation. The 2011 speech marked the United States on the “side of openness” in fighting for an Internet that would aid in fulfilling human rights, a more precise shaping of the balances and contradictions at stake, than was present a year earlier.
This speech – more rounded, more circumspect, is more precise and still prescriptive and committed.
At the end, the Secretary moves to the practical and instrumental. “We realize that in order to be meaningful, online freedoms must carry over into real world activism.”
A key paragraph:
While the rights we seek to protect and support are clear, the various ways that these rights are violated are increasingly complex. I know some have criticized us for not pouring funding into a single technology. But we believe there is not a silver bullet in the struggle against internet repression. There is no app for that. Start working those of you out there. And accordingly, we are taking a comprehensive and innovative approach, one that matches our diplomacy with technology, secure distribution networks for tools, and direct support for those on the front lines.
Here, implicit is defining the proper role of the US in furthering an open internet, in furthering the “right to connect” as Secretary Clinton tries to define it. State seems to be trying to find this spot — what combination of strenuous activities advances internet freedom.
Implicit is that some interventions can be counterproductive. Of course, it’s an appealing idea to say that opening up the sluices of information will swiftly bring down dictators, and that’s a plausible and welcome reading of events. But that’s the consequence of a system of approaches, not the pulling of an off/on switch.
Involved are myriad other activities, “supporting multiple tools”, as Clinton put it, connecting NGOs and advocates with technology and training, playing a role as “venture capitalist” for new technologies of freedom.
What mix is the right one, what judgments help produce the great human acts of bravery and the shift to democratic realisation. That remains subject to the hard realities of day to day executive judgment.
Professor Monroe Price is the director of the Center for Global Communication Studies at the Annenberg School for Communication, University of Pennsylvania
