TOM MALINOWSKI MAKES REMARKS ON THE 25 YEARS SINCE MONGOLIAN REVOLUTION

FROM:  U.S. STATE DEPARTMENT
Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor: Democracy and Free Speech: The Mongolian Experience at Twenty-Five Years
05/04/2015 12:22 PM EDT

Democracy and Free Speech: The Mongolian Experience at Twenty-Five Years

Remarks
Tom Malinowski
Assistant Secretary, Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor
Freedom Online Conference
Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia
May 3, 2015

I’m delighted to be here with you to celebrate the 2015 World Press Freedom Day. Every year at this time we reflect on the state of press freedom around the world and honor the sacrifices made by journalists who have lost their lives or been threatened or imprisoned for doing their job, for discovering and telling the truth.

So, as we thank journalists for their work, we also call on governments to recognize the universal human right to free expression both online and offline.

A free press keeps people informed and holds government accountable, and the fact is that we can’t govern honestly without it. This is as true today as it has ever been in the past. Now, it’s true that much has changed in our global media environment. In many developed democracies, there are fewer daily newspapers. More and more people get their information from social media. But whenever I hear about a journalist who is attacked or threatened or censored somewhere in the world, it reminds me just how important journalism is – if it wasn’t important, as a means of giving power to ordinary citizens and curbing the power of governments, no one would go to the trouble of trying to restrain it. In this sense, the death of journalists on the job is proof that the death of journalism – something people in my country ocassionally talk about – is a myth.

It is also, of course, a call to action for all countries committed to human rights. At the State Department last week, we launched our annual Free the Press campaign, in which we highlight cases of individual reporters who have been wrongly imprisoned in countries around the world. One of them is Gao Yu, a 71-year-old Chinese journalist; she was arrested last year, coerced into making a televised confession, and sentenced to seven years in jail. In Syria, Mazen Darwish remains imprisoned by the Asad regime for trying to expose the regime’s brutal atrocities. In Vietnam, Ta Phong Tan continues to serve a 10-year sentence for unmasking government corruption. In Ethiopia, Reeyot Alemu, was arrested for writing an article critical of the Ethiopian government, and remains in prison under terrorism charges.

On Friday, we also invited three journalists who have been censored or detained in their own countries, Russia, Ethiopia and Vietnam, to come to the White House and interview President Obama—because we thought that the best reward you can give to a journalist isn’t praise, it’s an exclusive interview with the President of the United States. When governments go after journalists, this is how the U.S. responds.

We’ve included more details about these brave journalists on www.HumanRights.gov. And we tweeted about these cases using the hashtag #FreethePress. I encourage all of you to share their stories with your community, be that through retweeting, drafting articles or blogs, or if you must, revert to that old-fashioned mode of communication—simply tell your family and friends.

I know that many of you in this room experienced the transition from living in a political system in which freedom of expression was not protected to living in a system that guarantees your power to speak and write according to the dictates of your conscience. Arguably more than many of us in the United States and Europe, you know how important these freedoms are.

It’s been twenty-five years now since Mongolia held a remarkable, peaceful democratic revolution. In an era that saw so much violence and upheaval, Mongolia provided an example of a swift and nonviolent transition to a government that seeks to listen to its people in order to, as we often say in America, form a more perfect union. As the Assistant Secretary of State for Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor, I wish there were more “Mongolias” in the world.

Mongolia has not rested on this significant achievement either. It has used the last 25 years to enact reforms protecting human rights and expanding social and economic opportunities for its citizens. Though there is still much difficult work to be done, the government has been doing what governments are supposed to do: removing restrictions on people to let them live lives of their own choosing according to their abilities.

Mongolia has also been recognized as one of the countries leading East Asia to a more democratic and free future. It is an active participant in important multilateral institutions, including the Community of Democracies and the Freedom Online Coalition. It recently chaired the Security Forum of the OSCE, it has been a strong partner of NATO and contributes above and beyond its size to UN Peacekeeping efforts in order to promote peace and security worldwide. We are grateful for Mongolia’s participation in those organizations to promote respect for democracy and human rights in the region.

I’d like to share with you a quote from a speech by President Elbegdorj [pron: EL-beg-dorj] before the Community of Democracies in 2013: “Mongolia stands ready to share her democratic lessons, achievements and success. We stand open to discuss our mistakes, the ways to correct them and to be studied by others. We are ready for action and engagement. Look at us as a center of democracy education, a life model for challenges and opportunities of freedom.”

It is important for countries that believe in these issues and share these values to band together. And Mongolia’s voice is particularly resonant. You are a democracy wedged between two countries with troubling human rights records and a history of censorship and suppression. You are the first country in Asia to participate in the Freedom Online Coalition. You may be smaller than your neighbors to the north and south, but your willingness to lead on these issues, to stick out your neck, makes Mongolia distinctive in the region. It increases Mongolia’s voice in the world.

And this, by the way, is good for you, too. It’s good for Mongolia’s future. You are more likely to attract foreign investment if you have a reputation as a stable country that respects the rule of law. Russia may have resources, strength, a sizable market, but its democratic failings have been felt in a powerful way. A smaller country with similar problems of corruption and abuse of power is simply not going to be able to compete. Your comparative advantage is your reputation.

Now, many factors have played a role in the success of Mongolia’s democracy, but there’s no doubt in my mind that a free media has been front and center. You’ve also faced a question every young democracy must answer, when it suddenly finds itself with dozens of new publications and TV and radio channels operating with few rules or traditions to guide their actions: how do you protect media freedom while encouraging media responsibility? This is a hard question. I would just leave you with this advice: Every country has good journalism and bad journalism. Every country has truth and falsehood in its media. But the government should not be the one deciding the difference. And the answer to bad journalism is not to put journalists in prison, even if we think a particular story they’ve published is untrue. Because when governments have the power to do that, they tend to use it against journalists who criticize them – against journalists who are just doing their job. A far better answer is to encourage the media to adopt high standards of its own, and to police them through strong mechanisms of self-regulation.

In your 25th year of democracy, the United States is eager to help you think through these challenges and build on your achievements thus far. We thank you for your commitment to democratic freedoms and for your leadership. You’ve set a powerful example not just in Asia but around the world, and I am certainly not alone in recognizing the value of our partnership. I would like to echo Vice-President Biden’s comments when he visited your country in 2011, which still ring true. He said we are “very proud to be considered a ‘third neighbor.’ And, like any good neighbor should, we’ll continue to do our part to support Mongolia’s political and economic development.”

On our panel today, we have Ms. Narajargal (Director of Globe International, NGO devoted to press freedom), MP Temuujin (former Minister of Justice), MP Batchimeg (human rights activist), Mr. Galaid (Director, Confederation of Mongolian Journalists), and Mr. Jargalsaikhan (famous Mongolian political and economic journalist). Thank you for joining us today and sharing your expertise as we examine the relationship between democracy and free speech in Mongolia.

Now I’m going to turn the floor over to the excellent panel assembled here today to discuss some of these issues. Please join me in welcoming them.

U.S. OFFICIAL'S REMARKS TO THE "FREEDOM ONLINE" CONFERENCE

Photo Credit:  CENTRAL INTELAGENCE AGENCY
FROM: U.S. STATE DEPARTMENT
Remarks to the "Freedom Online" Conference

Remarks
Michael H. Posner
Assistant Secretary, Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor
Second Freedom Online Conference
Nairobi, Kenya
September 5, 2012
I am delighted to be back in Kenya, a country I know well and where I have many friends and have spent considerable time. I want to commend the Kenyan government for hosting this conference and for the leadership role you are playing on Internet and information technology issues. I had the privilege of meeting with Minister Poghisio last December at the launch of the Coalition, and I am honored to be speaking after him today.

Kenya now has well over 15 million Internet users, and leads East Africa in mobile penetration, with more than two-thirds of all Kenyans now connected. The fact that so many African countries are participating in this conference is a tribute to Kenya’s leadership and convening power.

Kenya is not alone in embracing mobile and digital technologies. In neighboring Tanzania, for example, more than half of its citizens are using mobile phones. In Ghana, mobile penetration is now over 90%. These are statistics that were unimaginable a decade ago, and are cause for reflection and celebration.

Across Africa today, there is a new kind of race – a race to connect as many citizens as quickly as possible. By doing so, we are changing the development paradigm in ways none of us yet fully understand.

But while our technologies change, our fundamental principles and our development challenges do not. And so today I would like to say a few words about the role of Internet freedom, and how the free flow of information has implications for human rights and development.

Credit:  U.S. CIA World factbook

I believe it’s futile in the long run to try to separate one kind of freedom from another, to attempt to distinguish online freedoms from freedoms we enjoy in the physical world, or to try to keep the Internet open for business in a given country but closed for free expression. Because, as Secretary Clinton said at the first Freedom Online conference in The Hague in December, "There isn’t an economic Internet and a social Internet and a political Internet: there’s just the Internet."

Yet we continue to see attempts by countries to harness the economic power of the Internet while controlling political and cultural content. Some countries are devoting great resources to attempting to purge their online space or, like Iran, attempting to isolate their people inside what amounts to a national intra-net – a digital bubble. Such attempts may succeed for a limited time in some places; but at a cost to a nation’s education system, its political stability, its social mobility, and its economic potential.

These are costs that no nation can afford. Whether developed or developing, the economies of the 21st century must compete to attract capital, to spark innovation, to nurture the entrepreneurial spirit of our people and provide the climate in which they develop enterprises that can provide jobs and sustainable growth.

Around the world, some groups tend to focus more on erasing the digital divide, extending Internet access that last difficult mile, and putting into the hands of the next two billion users a mobile device that also provides access to banking and education, medical and agricultural advice and so much more. Meanwhile, other groups tend to focus more on Internet freedom, ensuring that the evolving information and communication technologies remain the foundation of an open, global platform for exchange, where people can exercise their rights, and not a tool used to spy on or silence citizens.

Today, the world has not one but two digital divides – the divide between the two billion of us who have some form of Internet access and the five billion who have yet to get it, and also a divide between those who enjoy the free use of their connectivity, and those whose experience of the Internet is restricted by censorship of the information they can receive and fear of retaliation for the information they transmit. The access divide is narrowing, thanks to the efforts of people around the world and the hard work of people in this room. But the second divide, the freedom divide, is widening.

We must continue to work together to erase both divides, and these interests must be pursued in tandem.

This is a world in which citizens of democratic nations can have uncensored Internet access and thus membership in a global community that exchanges news, information, ideas, products, innovations and services. At the same time it’s a world where citizens of some other countries remain trapped and isolated behind firewalls that stunt not just their political freedom but ultimately their economic opportunities. We must do everything possible to oppose what amounts to information curtain created by national governments that do not want their own people to have full and free access to the Internet.

There are no magic bullets that will erase this divide overnight, but the United States is committed to helping expand the benefits of information and communications technologies to other nations as an integral part of both our human rights and our development policies.

As President Obama wrote last week – in response to a question put to him during an Internet chat — "We will fight hard to make sure that the Internet remains the open forum for everybody — from those who are expressing an idea to those [who] want to start a business."

The United States takes a holistic approach to these issues. We recognize the linkages between broad-based access to 21st century communications and inclusive economic growth, and in turn between inclusive economic development and human rights. We know that human rights do not begin after breakfast. People need both. Without breakfast, few people have the energy to make full use of their rights. And after breakfast, they need both political and economic freedom to build profitable businesses and peaceful societies.

What does that mean in practice? It means the U.S. government is involved in a wide range of Information & Communication Technology development efforts from a variety of different agencies, from USAID to the National Science Foundation.

As a first step, companies, governments and civil society groups are starting to come together to work on this crucial issue. The goal is to find ways to achieve the UN target of providing entry-level broadband service for less than 5% of average monthly income. We recognize that governments have a role to play in creating the right incentives, ensuring healthy market competition, and supporting investment and continued infrastructure development that brings the Internet and mobile technology to more people in more places.

On the openness side, we have expanded our funding for Internet freedom advocacy and programming, for which the US Congress has allocated $100 million since 2008 to projects that provide technologies and knowledge to millions of people whose freedoms online are repressed. We are thrilled to be launching at this conference the Digital Defenders partnership, an unprecedented collaboration among governments to provide support for digital activists under threat.

But just as we support individuals who are targeted every day for exercising their rights online, we are conscious of a broader threat to the future of Internet openness. Right now, in various international forums, some countries are working to change how the Internet is governed. They want to replace the current multi-stakeholder approach, which supports the free flow of information in a global network, and includes governments, the private sector, and citizens. In its place, they aim to impose a system that expands control over Internet resources, institutions, and content, and centralizes that control in the hands of governments. These debates will play out in forums over the next few months and years.

The United States supports preserving and deepening the current multi-stakeholder approach because it brings together the best of governments, the private sector and civil society to manage the network, and it works. The multi-stakeholder system has kept the Internet up and running for years, all over the world. We want the next generation of Internet users — whether small business owners or independent journalists – to be involved in shaping the future of the platform.

That next generation of users will not just be in the United States. Many of them will be here in Africa. That is why we need to ensure that stakeholders in Africa and the rest of the developing world are able to participate in the various multi-stakeholder forums where Internet governance issues are decided. And that is why we value our partnership with the governments of the Coalition and welcome Kenya’s leadership, which leads by example in demonstrating that the right way to foster both access and openness – to harness the potential of these new technologies — is through inclusion and collaboration with everyone in this room.