The UN General Assembly opened last week with an electrifying
speech by President Dilma Rousseff who slammed US cyber-snooping
activities with President Barack Obama in the audience.
INTERNET spying by the US government became a major issue at the
United Nations General Assembly last week when political leaders heard a
blistering attack by the Brazilian president who was visibly angry
about how her country and her own office have been targets of
cyber-snooping activities.
She called the US action a breach of international law, a grave
violation of human rights and civil liberties, and a disrespect for
national sovereignty.
It was condemnation in the strongest terms at the highest political
forum in the world, with UN and commercial TV stations beaming the
speech live.
The surveillance issue, which has caused ripples with continuous
revelations in the media emerging from whistle-blower Edward Snowden’s
files, has now reached the UN.
And in the most spectacular fashion. It was an extraordinary scene
when President Dilma Rousseff gave the opening speech among the
government leaders gathered for the annual General Assembly.
Traditionally, Brazil’s president speaks first, followed by the US
president. Thus, Barack Obama could not avoid hearing her speech.
Many had expected Rousseff to touch on the Internet spying issue,
since she had strongly criticised the US when the media broke the news
on specific instances of US Internet surveillance on the Brazilian
President’s office, other departments, including the Brazilian Mission
to the UN, and the national oil company Petrobas. She recently cancelled
a state visit to Washington.
But her speech and performance was far beyond what was anticipated.
With the atmosphere electrifying in the packed hall of leaders, the
Brazilian president cut out the usual diplomatic niceties while
addressing one of the most sensitive issues to have emerged globally in
recent years.
She called it “a matter of great importance and gravity ... the
global network of electronic espionage that has caused indignation and
repudiation in public opinion around the world.”
Rousseff described the Internet spying as creating “a situation of
grave violation of human rights and of civil liberties; of invasion and
capture of confidential information concerning corporate activities, and
especially of disrespect to national sovereignty”.
She started by laying the foundation of her argument: “A sovereign
nation can never establish itself to the detriment of another sovereign
nation.
“The right to safety of citizens of one country can never be
guaranteed by violating fundamental human rights of citizens of another
country. The arguments that the illegal interception of information and
data aims at protecting nations against terrorism cannot be sustained.”
She said she fought against authoritarianism and censorship, and thus
has to uncompromisingly defend the right to privacy of individuals and
the sovereignty of her country.
“In the absence of the right to privacy, there can be no true freedom
of expression and opinion, and therefore no effective democracy. In the
absence of the respect for sovereignty, there is no basis for the
relationship among nations,” she added.
Her speech touched on three actions. First, Brazil had asked the US
for explanations, apologies and guarantees that such procedures will
never be repeated.
Second, Brazil is planning actions to defend itself from the spying.
It will “adopt legislation, technologies and mechanisms to protect us
from the illegal interception of communications and data”.
Third, she proposed international action, saying: “Information and
telecommunication technologies cannot be the new battlefield between
states. Time is ripe to create the conditions to prevent cyberspace from
being used as a weapon of war, through espionage, sabotage, and attacks
against systems and infrastructure of other countries.”
Stating that the UN must play a leading role to regulate the conduct
of states with regard to these technologies, she called for the setting
up of “a civilian multilateral framework for the governance and use of
the Internet and to ensure the effective protection of data that travels
through the web”.
She proposed multilateral mechanisms for the worldwide network, based
on the principles of freedom of expression, privacy and human rights;
open, multilateral and democratic governance; universality; cultural
diversity; and neutrality of the network, guided only by technical and
ethical criteria, with no restrictions allowed on political, commercial,
religious grounds.
Delegates who hoped that Obama would respond were disappointed. He
did not refer to the Brazilian president’s address made only a few
minutes before.
He made only a passing reference to the issue, saying: “we are reviewing the way we gather intelligence.”
Rousseff’s speech came at the right time and venue, since people
worldwide have been increasingly troubled or outraged by the extent of
cyber-spying revealed by the media.
The issue is even more serious for developing countries. Media
reports indicate that there are double standards, with the US spying
programme requiring a special court procedure for opening data on
individual US citizens, while there is no such procedure for residents
outside the US, and thus the surveillance is comprehensive for the world
outside the US, with the citizens, companies and government offices all
being targets.
Moreover, the media reports show that the US actions do not stop at
surveillance. There are also schemes to engage in cyber actions or
attacks.
Rousseff’s speech at the UN indicates Brazil plans follow-up moves in
the UN for setting up a multilateral system to regulate the use and
misuse of the Internet. This would be a timely international response to
the recent revelations.
Contributed by Global Trends, MARTIN KHOR
The views expressed are entirely the writer’s own.
Related posts:
Upset over US cyber spying!
Abusing intelligence is stupid
US Spy Snowden Says US Hacking China Since 2009
No privacy on the Net !
US building new spy wing to focus on Asia
Flawed perception remembering Heroes and Zeroes
Share This
Showing posts with label US Cyber-snooping. Show all posts
Showing posts with label US Cyber-snooping. Show all posts
Monday, September 30, 2013
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)