[Senate Hearing 117-356]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
S. Hrg. 117-356
THE ASSAULT ON FREEDOM
OF EXPRESSION IN ASIA
=======================================================================
HEARING
BEFORE THE
SUBCOMMITTEE ON EAST ASIA,
THE PACIFIC, AND INTERNATIONAL
CYBERSECURITY POLICY
OF THE
COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN RELATIONS
UNITED STATES SENATE
ONE HUNDRED SEVENTEENTH CONGRESS
SECOND SESSION
__________
MARCH 30, 2022
__________
Printed for the use of the Committee on Foreign Relations
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Available via http://www.govinfo.gov
______
U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE
48-425PDF WASHINGTON : 2022
COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN RELATIONS
ROBERT MENENDEZ, New Jersey, Chairman
BENJAMIN L. CARDIN, Maryland JAMES E. RISCH, Idaho
JEANNE SHAHEEN, New Hampshire MARCO RUBIO, Florida
CHRISTOPHER A. COONS, Delaware RON JOHNSON, Wisconsin
CHRISTOPHER MURPHY, Connecticut MITT ROMNEY, Utah
TIM KAINE, Virginia ROB PORTMAN, Ohio
EDWARD J. MARKEY, Massachusetts RAND PAUL, Kentucky
JEFF MERKLEY, Oregon TODD YOUNG, Indiana
CORY A. BOOKER, New Jersey JOHN BARRASSO, Wyoming
BRIAN SCHATZ, Hawaii TED CRUZ, Texas
CHRIS VAN HOLLEN, Maryland MIKE ROUNDS, South Dakota
BILL HAGERTY, Tennessee
Damian Murphy, Staff Director
Christopher M. Socha, Republican Staff Director
John Dutton, Chief Clerk
SUBCOMMITTEE ON EAST ASIA, THE PACIFIC,
AND INTERNATIONAL CYBERSECURITY POLICY
EDWARD J. MARKEY, Massachusetts, Chairman
CHRISTOPHER A. COONS, Delaware MITT ROMNEY, Utah
CHRISTOPHER MURPHY, Connecticut TED CRUZ, Texas
BRIAN SCHATZ, Hawaii RON JOHNSON, Wisconsin
JEFF MERKLEY, Oregon MIKE ROUNDS, South Dakota
BILL HAGERTY, Tennessee
(ii)
C O N T E N T S
----------
Page
Markey, Hon. Edward J., U.S. Senator From Massachusetts.......... 1
Romney, Hon. Mitt, U.S. Senator From Utah........................ 14
Prepared Statement........................................... 14
Ressa, Maria, 2021 Nobel Peace Prize Laureate, Co-Founder of
Rappler,
Manila, the Philippines........................................ 3
Prepared Statement........................................... 6
Siu, Joey, Policy Advisor, Hong Kong Watch, Washington, DC....... 9
Prepared Statement........................................... 11
Cook, Sarah, Research Director for China, Hong Kong, and Taiwan,
Freedom House, Washington, DC.................................. 15
Prepared Statement........................................... 17
(iii)
THE ASSAULT ON FREEDOM
OF EXPRESSION IN ASIA
----------
WEDNESDAY, MARCH 30, 2022
U.S. Senate,
Subcommittee on East Asia, the Pacific, and
International Cybersecurity Policy,
Committee on Foreign Relations,
Washington, DC.
The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 2:07 p.m., in
room SD-106, Dirksen Senate Office Building, Hon. Edward J.
Markey presiding.
Present: Senators Markey [presiding] and Romney.
OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. EDWARD J. MARKEY,
U.S. SENATOR FROM MASSACHUSETTS
Senator Markey. It is a pleasure to chair this hearing on
freedom of expression under assault in Asia. I want to thank
Senator Romney for his cooperation on this hearing and the
great work we have done together over the past year on this
subcommittee.
I want to thank each of the witnesses for appearing today.
I look forward to hearing your testimony.
Around the world, freedom of expression, one of the
underpinnings of democracy, is under attack. We have seen that
countries throughout the Asia Pacific region have become models
for repression and censorship.
In Cambodia, Burma, Philippines, Hong Kong, and China,
authoritarian leaders seek to cement their power at the expense
of the people, relentlessly crushing dissent and silencing
opposition.
They have weaponized laws to bring those who speak out to
heel, to inspire self-censorship, to sow fear and discord,
often under the veneer of the legal system. We cannot protect
democracy at home or abroad if we do not protect the right to
nonviolent self-expression and freedom of the press.
Unfortunately, today, the Asia Pacific region is leading
the world in efforts to restrict freedom of expression. China,
Burma, and Vietnam were among the top five worst jailers of
journalists globally last year, according to the Committee to
Protect Journalists.
In Cambodia, Hun Sen and his cronies continue to backslide
into authoritarianism by using the COVID-19 pandemic as
justification to crack down on journalists and opposition
figures.
Journalism can be a deadly business even in democracies.
Just 36 hours before Maria Ressa accepted her Nobel Peace
Prize, one of her colleagues was shot and killed in the
Philippines, and Maria has risked her own freedom to protect
the universal bedrock principles of a free press and rule of
law.
Sarah Cook of Freedom House, a stalwart, has spent her
career shining a light on abuses against these very freedoms.
As Hong Kong authorities have wielded a new National Security
Law to clamp down on political activity, grassroots activists
like Joey Siu are on the front lines of defending freedom for
Hong Kongers.
We need journalists, activists, and ordinary citizens to
continue to speak truth to power and to shine a light on
government abuses, from genocide in Burma and to Xinjiang to
politically motivated detentions in the Philippines.
The People's Republic of China has made its authoritarian
campaign of repression a key export to other countries. In
2016, Xi Jinping told state media, ``Wherever the readers are,
wherever the viewers are, that is where propaganda reports must
extend their tentacles.''
Those tentacles have permeated Taiwan, where PRC
disinformation and media influence operations have increased in
the past several years.
Taiwan is the subject to more disinformation from Beijing
and other governments than any other place in the world,
including in the run up to Taiwan's 2020 presidential election.
The PRC is spending billions to expand the global reach of
its state-run media outlets exporting its authoritarian model.
This is why I worked with my colleagues to secure the single
greatest increase in funding in Radio Free Asia's 25-year
history in the Senate-passed Innovation and Competition Act.
Additionally, my Asia Reassurance Initiative Act, which
former chair of this subcommittee, Cory Gardner, and I
championed together, authorized more than $1 billion over 5
years to support democracy, human rights, and the rule of law
in the Indo-Pacific.
The United States must do more to push back against the
authoritarian playbook of repression and hold up these values
as a focal point of American foreign policy.
I look forward to hearing the recommendations from the
witnesses on how the United States can better support freedom
of expression and push back against the assault that is
underway in Asia.
We are going to be hearing from Senator Romney in just a
bit. He has been delayed. He does believe this is just a very,
very important hearing to shine a spotlight on these human
rights abuses.
So joining us, after arriving from the Philippines earlier
this week, is Ms. Maria Ressa. Ms. Ressa is 2021 Nobel Peace
Prize Laureate, co-founder of the online news publication
Rappler, and has worked as a journalist in Asia for more than
three decades.
Ms. Ressa received the Nobel Peace Prize along with Russian
journalist Dmitry Muratov for their efforts to safeguard
freedom of expression.
Ms. Ressa is a fearless champion of freedom of expression
and has used her voice to expose the abuses of the regime of
President Duterte.
We welcome you, Ms. Ressa, and I would ask for you to begin
your presentation and then I will introduce the other witnesses
as you complete your testimony.
So we welcome you, and we congratulate you on your well-
deserved victory of the Nobel Peace Prize of 2021. You are just
a beacon of hope and the whole rest of the world really, really
owes you a debt of gratitude.
So whenever you feel comfortable, please begin.
STATEMENT OF MARIA RESSA, 2021 NOBEL PEACE PRIZE LAUREATE, CO-
FOUNDER OF RAPPLER, MANILA, THE PHILIPPINES
Ms. Ressa. Thank you. Thank you so much, Senator Markey.
Thank you for inviting me to speak today.
I really would like to share only three points, first, to
tell you what we are living through as journalists, as human
rights defenders in the Philippines; second, how technology for
profit has become an insidious tool for tyranny globally and
what you can do; and finally, what we are doing to help
safeguard our elections in exactly 40 days. This is--I call it
an ``avengers assemble'' moment in my nation's battle for
facts.
I have been a journalist for more than 36 years, so I am
old. In 2016, Rappler came under intense online attack because
we exposed the brutal drug war and the propaganda machine that
was attacking journalists, news organizations, human rights
defenders, and opposition politicians.
The weaponization of social media you referenced, well, we
lived through it, but that was followed by lawfare, the
weaponization of the law, twisting the law to target us.
In 2018, the Philippine Government tried to revoke
Rappler's license to operate, and while we continue to fight it
legally, within 4 months we lost 49 percent of our advertising
revenue. In less than 2 years my government filed 10 arrest
warrants against me.
In order to travel, I am--you never realize how wonderful
that freedom to travel is until it is taken away--I have to ask
permission from the courts. Sometimes I get it. Sometimes I do
not.
One of the times my travel was denied at the last minute
was when my aging parents in Florida, both ill, had asked me to
come because my mom was getting an operation. It was--I got a
``no'' from the last court at the last minute.
Shortly after the Nobel Peace Prize, Rappler has received
22 new complaints, potential new legal cases. Last Friday, we
received eight in one day--eight subpoenas.
We must be doing something right because not only did a
sitting cabinet secretary sue seven news organizations,
including Rappler, but another is a petition at the Supreme
Court by the solicitor general alleging ridiculous conspiracy
theories against Rappler.
I wish it was true, but it was not. No, I do not wish it
was true. That is a joke.
The majority of these other complaints are connected to
President Duterte's pastor. His name is Apollo Quiboloy. He is
wanted by the FBI. His company, leading the attack against
journalists and human rights activists, it was just awarded a
television franchise.
All told, I could go to jail for the rest of my life
because I refuse to stop doing my job as a journalist, because
Rappler holds the line and continues to protect the public
sphere.
I am lucky. Remember, Senator Leila de Lima, a former
justice secretary and head of the Commission on Human Rights
last month, began her sixth year in prison. Amnesty
International calls her a prisoner of conscience.
Or young journalist Frenchie Mae Cumpio, who spent her last
two birthdays in prison. Or my former colleague, Jess Malabanan
you referenced. He was killed by a bullet to his head. He
worked on Reuter's Drug War series that won a Pulitzer Prize.
Or ABS-CBN, the largest broadcaster in the Philippines, a
newsroom I headed for 6 years, which in 2020 lost its franchise
to operate. The last time that happened was when Ferdinand
Marcos declared martial law in 1972.
For the people who defend us, our lawyers, there are costs.
More lawyers than journalists have been killed under the
Duterte administration. Hundreds of human rights activists are
dead and the numbers killed in our brutal drug war--this--from
thousands, the tens of thousands, who really knows--that is the
first casualty in the Philippines battle for facts.
This brings us to my second point, how technology has
degraded facts and broken our societies. Like the age of
industrialization, there is a new economic model that has
brought new harms, a model Shoshana Zuboff called surveillance
capitalism.
When our atomized personal experiences are collected by
machine learning, organized by artificial intelligence,
extracting our private lives for outsized corporate gain,
highly profitable micro-targeting operations are engineered to
structurally undermine human will.
It is a behavior modification system in which we are
Pavlov's dogs, experimented on in real time, with disastrous
consequences.
This is happening to you, to all of us around the world.
Engagement-based metrics of these American technology companies
mean that the incentive structure of the algorithms, which is
really just their opinion in code, implemented at a scale that
we could never have imagined, is insidiously shaping our future
by encouraging the worst of human behavior. It is also choosing
what journalism survives.
Studies have shown that lies laced with anger and hate
spread faster and further than facts, and these next sentences
I have said repeatedly for the last 6 years. Without facts, you
cannot have truth. Without truth, you cannot have trust.
Without trust, we have no shared reality, no rule of law, no
democracy.
Now these networks form a global nervous system of toxic
sludge fueled by geopolitical power play. In 2018, after the
senate released the data from the IRA, the GRU, we connected
the information operations in the Philippines with Russian
disinformation networks.
In 2020, Facebook took down information operations from
China that were then creating fake accounts for the U.S.
presidential elections. Simultaneously, in the Philippines it
was polishing the image of the Marcoses.
It was campaigning for China, campaigning for the daughter
of President Duterte, and attacking me and Rappler. These are
multi-purpose networks.
In 2021, the U.S. and the EU called out China and Russia
for COVID-19 disinformation. We are all connected. Surveillance
capitalism is where all our problems connect--safety, privacy,
antitrust, and content moderation. They are not separate
issues.
The platforms wanted to debate content moderation down here
because if you are stuck down here they can make more money. So
we need to move further upstream to the algorithms, the
operating system of this information ecosystem, the algorithms
of amplification, and then we go further upstream to the root
cause, surveillance capitalism.
On Thursday, March 24--last week--the European Union
hammered out the last details of the Market Services Act to be
followed by the Digital Services Act. It is the most
comprehensive legislation to put guard rails around tech, but
these will take time.
Right now, I appeal to U.S. legislators to reform or revoke
Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act because we, at
the frontlines, need immediate help. We cannot solve the global
existential problems if we do not win the battle for facts and
we cannot have integrity of elections if we do not have
integrity of facts.
In exactly 40 days, the Philippines will vote in what is an
existential moment for our democracy. The front runner for
president is Ferdinand Marcos, Jr., whose family was ousted by
a people power revolt 36 years ago.
He is back, partly because history was revised in plain
view with networks of misinformation on American social media
platforms, which we, at Rappler, exposed and we released that
data publicly.
I have submitted to you and the members of this--the Senate
in this hearing the whole-of-society approach that we are
trying to use to protect the facts, a four-layer pyramid we
call #FactsFirstPH. I can answer any questions you may have
about that.
Since it is succeeding, we have these new legal challenges
and our news sites--there are 16 news groups cooperating
together in this--we have come under expanded DDoS attacks that
are meant to take us down.
These exponential lies on social media are like DDoS
attacks on our brains, attacking our biology, leaving
journalists, human rights activists, opposition politicians
defenseless.
The platforms and the autocrats that exploit them must be
held accountable and democratic governments must move faster.
In that sense, Russia's invasion of Ukraine has galvanized
action and is forcing solutions.
For countries like the Philippines, please consider the
Magnitsky sanctions. Democratic nations must stand together for
democratic values. The solution is three pronged and remains
the core pillars of Rappler: technology, journalism, community.
First, put guardrails around tech, build better tech;
second, strengthen journalism and help fund independent news,
part of the reason I agreed to co-chair the International Fund
for Public Interest Media; third, build communities of action
that stand by these democratic values.
I could go to jail for the rest of my life just because I
am a journalist. What I do now will determine whether that will
happen.
Thank you for your support. Thank you for your help. Now
action is up to you.
[The prepared statement of Ms. Ressa follows:]
Prepared Statement of Ms. Maria Ressa
Thank you for inviting me to speak to you today. My name is Maria
Ressa. I would like to share three points with you: first, what we are
living through as journalists and human rights defenders in the
Philippines; second, how technology for profit has become an insidious
tool for tyranny globally; and finally, what we are doing to help
safeguard our elections in 40 days. This is an Avengers, Assemble
moment in our nation's battle for facts.
lawfare
I've been a journalist for more than 36 years. I am a co-founder of
Rappler in the Philippines. In 2016, we came under intense online
attack because we exposed the brutal drug war and the propaganda
machine that was attacking journalists, news organizations, human
rights defenders, and opposition politicians. The weaponization of
social media was followed by lawfare, twisting the law to target those
same groups. In 2018, the Philippine Government tried to revoke
Rappler's license to operate, and while we continued to fight it
legally, within 4 months, we lost 49 percent of our advertising
revenue. In less than 2 years, my government filed 10 arrest warrants
against me. In order to travel, I have to ask for permission from the
courts. Sometimes I get it. Sometimes I don't. One of the times my
travel was denied at the last minute was when my aging parents, both
ill, had asked me to come because my mom was getting an operation.
In the past few months, we've had 22 new complaints, potential new
legal cases, filed against us. Last Friday, we received 8 in one day.
We must be doing something right because not only did a sitting cabinet
secretary \1\ sue 7 news organizations, but another is a petition at
the Supreme Court \2\ by the Solicitor General alleging unfounded
conspiracy theories against Rappler. The majority of these complaints
\3\ are connected to President Duterte's pastor, Apollo Quiboloy,
wanted \4\ by the FBI, whose company leading the attack against
journalists and human rights activists \5\ was recently awarded a
television franchise.\6\ Last week, I testified in court in a case
where the alleged tax we owed--P200,000 was far less than the P1.2
million I had posted in that court in bail and bonds to stay free and
keep working.
All told, I could go to jail for the rest of my life. Because I
refuse to stop doing my job as a journalist. Because Rappler holds the
line and continues to protect the public sphere.
It feels like we're living in an alternative universe, and the
Queen is shouting, ``off with her head!''
But I'm lucky.
violence, jail, shutdown
Remember Senator Leila de Lima, a former justice secretary and head
of the Commission on Human Rights, last month began her sixth year in
prison. Amnesty International calls her a prisoner of conscience.
Or young journalist Frenchie Mae Cumpio, who spent her last two
birthdays in prison.
Or former colleague Jess Malabanan, killed by a bullet to his head.
He worked on Reuters' drug war series that won a Pulitzer Prize.
Or ABS-CBN, the largest broadcaster in the Philippines--a newsroom
I headed for 6 years, which in 2020 lost its franchise to operate. The
last time that happened was when Ferdinand Marcos declared martial law
in 1972.
For the people who defend us, there are costs. More lawyers have
been killed \7\ than journalists under the Duterte administration: at
least 66 compared to at least 22. And the toll for human rights
activists \8\ as of August last year hit at least 421 dead. Last year
on March 7, nine trade union leaders and human rights activists were
killed \9\ in simultaneous early morning police raids--now known as
Bloody Sunday. And the numbers killed in our brutal drug war--from
thousands to tens of thousands--is the first casualty in our battle for
facts.
surveillance capitalism's harms and the destruction of trust
That brings us to my second point: how technology has degraded
facts and broken our societies. I became a journalist because I believe
that information is power--it's how we get justice. The death of
democracy began when journalists lost our gatekeeping powers to the
technology platforms that not only abdicated responsibility for
protecting us . . . but also destroyed democracy by destroying the
facts . . . for immense profit.
Like the age of industrialization, there's a new economic model
that brought new harms, a model Shoshana Zuboff called surveillance
capitalism--when our atomized personal experiences are collected by
machine learning, organized by artificial intelligence--extracting our
private lives for outsized corporate gain. Highly profitable micro-
targeting operations are engineered to structurally undermine human
will--a behavior modification system in which we are Pavlov's dogs,
experimented on in real time with disastrous consequences. This is
happening to you--to all of us around the world.
Engagement based metrics of these American tech companies mean that
the incentive structure of the algorithms, which is just their opinion
in code implemented at a scale that we could never have imagined, is
insidiously shaping our future by encouraging the worst of human
behavior. Studies have shown that lies laced with anger and hate spread
faster and further than facts.
Without facts, you can't have truth. Without truth, you can't have
trust. Without these, we have no shared reality, no rule of law, no
democracy.
In my upcoming book, the prologue I submitted last year began with
the splintering of reality in Crimea in 2014. I had to revise that when
Russia invaded Ukraine using the same narratives seeded then. Would
that have happened if the platforms had acted 8 years ago? That is the
true cost for the world.
Now these networks form a global nervous system of toxic sludge
partly fueled by geopolitical power play. In 2018, we connected the
information operations in the Philippines with Russian disinformation
networks through websites in Canada. In 2020, Facebook took down
information operations from China that were creating fake accounts for
the U.S. elections, polishing the image of the Marcoses, campaigning
for Duterte's daughter, and attacking me and Rappler. In 2021, the U.S.
and the EU called out China and Russia for Covid-19 disinformation.
We are all connected.
legislation
How will we deal with surveillance capitalism today? That's where
all our problems connect: safety, privacy, antitrust, and content
moderation. They're not separate issues.
The platforms want you to debate content moderation because if
you're stuck there, they can make more money. So move further upstream
to algorithmic amplification, its operating system, and go further
upstream to its root cause: surveillance capitalism.
On Thursday, March 24, 2022, the European Union hammered out the
last details of the Market Services Act, to be followed by the Digital
Services Act, the most comprehensive legislation to put guardrails
around tech. These will take time. Right now, I appeal to U.S.
legislators to reform or revoke section 230 of the Communications
Decency Act because we at the front lines need immediate help.
battle for facts
We cannot solve the global existential problems if we don't win the
battle for facts. And we cannot have integrity of elections if we don't
have integrity of facts.
In 40 days, the Philippines will vote in an existential moment for
our democracy. The frontrunner for president is Ferdinand Marcos, Jr.,
whose family was ousted by a people power revolt 36 years ago. He's
back partly because history was revised in plain view, with networks of
disinformation, which we at Rappler exposed, releasing the data
publicly.
So we decided to collaborate to find a solution. Here's one way
media, civil society, the academe, and the law can work together to
deal with the viral speed of lies and the preferential distribution of
anger and hate.
This is the pyramid we built.
This is #FactsFirstPH:
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
It begins with our communities--individuals reporting lies to our
tiplines, the data layer that unites the pyramid. For the first time,
at least 16 news groups are working together in the foundational layer.
Once the fact checks are done, it moves to the mesh layer, civil
society groups, non-governmental organizations, schools, business
groups, and the Church joining together to mount their own campaigns
for facts, creating a mesh of distribution. That data then travels to
the third layer, the disinformation research groups finally working
together, which weekly releases research to tell Filipinos exactly how
we're being manipulated and by whom. Finally, the layer that's long
been needed: the law--legal groups across the spectrum focused on
filing tactical and strategic litigation.
Until legislation--guard rails for tech--are put in place,
communities must find a way to collaborate and to use technology and
data against this global behavior modification system that has become
the preferred tools for autocrats, not because they're so good, but
because the platforms are so bad.
It's been only a few weeks, but all news groups have been under new
sustained DDoS attacks to take us all down, and we have a petition at
the Supreme Court by the Solicitor General saying that fact-checking is
prior restraint. So it's working.
stop the impunity
Eight years after the annexation of Crimea, elections are
existential globally--even as the global landscape is being reshaped
with ``Autocrats Inc'' emerging stronger. If lies win in the
Philippines, we again become the first domino to fall in the global
descent to tyranny. As news groups in the Philippines now face renewed
and expanded DDoS attacks against our sites meant to take us down,
these exponential lies are like DDoS attacks on our brains, attacking
our biology, leaving us defenseless.
The platforms--and the autocrats that exploit them--must be held
accountable, and governments doing this must move at a faster pace. In
that sense, Russia's invasion of Ukraine has brought nations together
and may bring solutions for the continued impunity of platforms. For
countries like the Philippines, consider Magnitsky sanctions.
Democratic nations must stand together for democratic values. The
solution is three-pronged, and remain the core pillars of Rappler:
technology, journalism, community. First: Put guardrails around the
tech; build better tech. Second: strengthen journalism, and help fund
independent news--part of the reason I agreed to co-chair the
International Fund for Public Interest Media. Third, build communities
of action that stand by these democratic values.
I could go to jail for the rest of my life. Just because I'm a
journalist. But what I do now will determine whether that will happen.
So I pledge to #HoldTheLine. These times demand more, and journalists
have met--and will meet those demands.
Now it's up to you.
----------------
Notes
\1\ Cusi sues Rappler, 6 other news orgs for libel over Malampaya-
Dennis Uy reports, Journalist groups decry Cusi and Uy's libel suits
over Malampaya deal reports, Philstar.com, and Cusi libel complaints an
``embarrassment' for PH--Maria Ressa's lawyers
\2\ Calida to SC: Void Rappler-Comelec fact-check deal for
violating free speech and Marcos and Calida in sync anew, this time vs
Rappler's Comelec deal
\3\ Quiboloy workers file a dozen cyber libel complaints vs Rappler
and Rappler answers a dozen cyber libel complaints from Quiboloy
workers
\4\ Quiboloy, 2 associates on FBI's most wanted list
\5\ Quiboloy's SMNI fuels disinformation, online attacks on gov't
critics
\6\ Channel 43, used by ABS-CBN, goes to Quiboloy's SMNI
\7\ On last day of 2021, Cavite prosecutor becomes 66th lawyer
killed under Duterte
\8\ In 2021, activists, human rights defenders fight to survive
under Duterte and A bloody trail: People we lost under Duterte
\9\ UN slams Philippine police for killing nine activists, News,
DW, 09.03.2021
Senator Markey. Thank you so much and, again, it is just an
honor to have you here before the committee--the risks that you
have taken, the sacrifice that you have made. The leadership
that you have provided, not just for the Philippines, but for
the whole world is absolutely immeasurable. So thank you.
Next, we are going to hear from Ms. Joey Siu, who, again,
is a student activist, a policy advisor at Hong Kong Watch, and
advisor to the Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China.
She participated actively in Hong Kong's pro-democracy
movement by organizing local grassroots campaigns and
international advocacy for Hong Kong.
Her focus is on human rights in Hong Kong, East Turkestan,
Tibet, and other regions in China, and she writes on U.S.-China
relations and Hong Kong politics.
We welcome you, Ms. Siu.
Whenever you are ready, please begin.
STATEMENT OF JOEY SIU, POLICY ADVISOR,
HONG KONG WATCH, WASHINGTON, DC
Ms. Siu. Good afternoon and thank you, Chairman Markey, and
thank you, Maria, and also Sarah for their very outstanding
work in defending human rights and also, most importantly,
freedom of expression.
So my name is Joey Siu. I am the policy advisor to Hong
Kong Watch. I was born in North Carolina and moved to Hong Kong
when I was seven.
I became an activist, and in September 2020 I was forced to
flee Hong Kong, to leave my family and friends, and come back
to the States under the risk of political persecution with the
National Security Law implemented by the Chinese Government in
Hong Kong.
From crackdowns on social movements in Hong Kong, Thailand,
and Myanmar to the tightening control over Tibet and East
Turkestan, we are seeing governments resorting to every
conceivable measure to limit the people's right to freedom of
expression across Asia.
Today, I will be highlighting the situations in Hong Kong,
Tibet, and East Turkestan.
In Hong Kong, protestor Tong Ying-kit became the first
person to become be convicted under the National Security Law
that came into effect in Hong Kong on July 1, 2020. He was
sentenced to 9 years in jail for ``inciting secession'' and
``terrorism'' under the National Security Law.
In the verdict passed down it was made clear that the
protest slogans on the banner he held ``Liberate Hong Kong;
Revolution of Our Times'' was weighed heavily in the
determining of his sentencing, meaning that expression of
support to all pro-democracy movements in Hong Kong is becoming
considered criminal.
British colonial laws and the widely criticized public
order ordinance were also used against human rights defenders
in Hong Kong. Rallies and assemblies, including the city's
annual June 4th Tiananmen massacre commemoration events, were
banned in Hong Kong.
Organizers, including Albert Ho, Lee Cheuk-yan, and also
Chow Hang-tung, they were arrested and convicted for
``participating in the inciting and unauthorized assembly''
under the public order ordinance.
COVID-19 restrictions were also manipulated by the Hong
Kong Government to repress activities that do not align with
the Chinese Communist regime's political stances.
As we, people across the world, stand in solidarity with
Ukraine against Russia's invasion, we are seeing people in Hong
Kong participating in peaceful pro-Ukraine demonstrations being
fined, being warned by the Hong Kong Government for what they
say are a violation of relevant COVID rules.
Free press is also quickly vanishing in Hong Kong. At least
18 journalists have been arrested since 2019 since our pro-
democracy movement broke out, and 12 remain in jail while
waiting for trial, including our very prominent, very leading
pro-democracy figure, our media tycoon Jimmy Lai, and under
mounting political pressure almost all of these independent
pro-democracy media outlets in Hong Kong are forcibly shut
down. Fearing date-back charges with the National Security Law,
they have to delta previous articles and reportings as they
cease operations. An increasing number of reporters and also
journalists in Hong Kong are now forced to leave the city.
Online expression and also internet access are also under
tighter restrictions. Since May 2021, access to several pro-
democracy websites were found blocked and our organization,
Hong Kong Watch's, website is among one of them.
Free expression is also seriously encroaching in Tibet and
East Turkestan. According to Freedom House ``Freedom in the
World'' 2022 report, Tibet was ranked again for the second year
in a row the least free country worldwide.
It is one of the most restricted and strictly monitored
regions across the globe with heavy police presence and also
surveillance that has created an almost complete information
blackout in Tibet.
Last month, a popular young Tibetan singer, Tsewang Norbu,
self-immolated in front of the Potala Palace in Lhasa. The
Chinese Government very quickly took control over the scene and
restricted information from being reported and circulated.
It took Tibetans in exile and also other human rights
organizations almost a month just to confirm the news that it
really happened. Because Beijing does not allow any foreign
media presence in Tibet, it is incredibly hard and time-
consuming for people outside to obtain first hand information.
The escalating restrictions on freedom of expression,
including censorship and also the cutting off of internet and
mobile communications, this is so impossible for the Tibetan
people inside of the region to relay information to the outside
world or even to circulate news among themselves.
The Chinese Communist regime's ``anti-extremism'' policies
in the Uighur region is yet another example illustrating the
horrific assault on freedom of expression. With all-around
surveillance systems installed across the region, Uighurs
cannot express their opinions, faith, or culture freely.
At least 1.5 million Uighurs were arrested for irrelevant
reasons and are now detained in camps experiencing political
indoctrination, horrendous physical and sexual abuses, with
absolutely no room for free expression.
As freedom of expression continues to be under assault
across Asia, it is important that the United States continue to
fulfill our obligations and demonstrate leadership in defending
our shared beliefs and also values.
First of all, it is so crucial that we offer necessary
humanitarian relocation channels for all those who have well
founded fear of persecution, especially politically exposed
journalists, activists, and protesters.
Secondly, I believe that we should continue to enhance our
support to assisting government-funded media services,
including, as Chairman Markey had mentioned, Radio Free Asia
and Voice of America.
I think it would also be considerable that we extend our
support to media agencies proximate to the oppressed regions in
Asia in democratic countries like Taiwan and Japan to ensure
the continuous and timely coverage of developments.
Last, but not least, beyond individual actions, it is also
essential that we continue to work with like-minded partners
and to lead a multilateral alliance to defend free expression
against encroachment from authoritarian regimes.
Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Ms. Siu follows:]
Prepared Statement of Ms. Joey Siu
My name is Joey Siu, the policy advisor to Hong Kong Watch. I was
born in North Carolina and moved to Hong Kong when I was 7-years-old. I
became a student activist and served as the Vice President at City
University of Hong Kong's Student Union. In September 2020, I was
forced to flee the city under risks of persecution with the National
Security Law.
increasing threats to freedom of expression in asia
As democracy movements ignite across Asia, we are witnessing an
escalation of assault on free expression in the region. From the
crackdowns on social movements in Hong Kong, Thailand and Myanmar, to
the tightening control over Tibet, East Turkestan and mainland China,
governments have been resorting to every conceivable means to limit the
people's right to free speech, assembly and expression, by enacting
draconian laws and policies, persecuting journalists and human rights
advocates, prohibiting assemblies and media.
I will be highlighting the situations in Hong Kong, Tibet and East
Turkestan.
freedom of expression dismantled in hong kong
The National Security Law was passed by China's National People's
Congress and came into force in Hong Kong on July 1, 2020. As stated in
the legislation, any permanent resident of the Hong Kong Special
Administrative Region or any foreign person who are convicted under
offenses of ``secession,'' ``subversion,'' ``terrorism'' or ``collusion
with foreign forces'' would face up to life-time imprisonment.
Making use of the draconian legislation together with old colonial
laws, widely-criticized ordinances, police aggression and COVID-19
restrictions, the Hong Kong Government is in the process of dismantling
freedom of expression in the city.
Free Speech and Assembly
Under the National Security Law, pro-democracy rallies, protest
slogans and symbols, and anti-government criticisms are strictly
proscribed. On July 31, 2021, protester TONG Ying-kit became the first
person to be convicted under the National Security Law and was
sentenced to 9 years of imprisonment for ``inciting session'' and
``terrorism.'' In verdicts passed down, the prosecutors made clear that
the protest slogan on the banner he held, ``Liberate Hong Kong;
Revolution of Our Times,'' weighed heavily in determining his
sentencing, meaning that his expression of support for the protests was
now considered criminal. Hundreds more face similar sentencing under
the National Security Law which is now having a profound chilling
effect on free expression.
Aside from offenses under the National Security Law, activists
continue to face trumped-up charges under colonial-era laws. Earlier
this month, prominent pro-democracy figure TAM Tak-chi was convicted of
``seditious speech'' under British colonial-era laws, for organizing
street booths and chanting anti-Hong Kong police slogans. The Hong Kong
Government has only begun to use this archaic colonial legislation in
the last 2 years. Alongside the National Security Law it represents a
significant blow to free expression.
Pro-democracy assemblies, including the city's annual June 4th
Tiananmen Massacre commemoration are also banned. Albert HO, LEE Cheuk-
yan and CHOW Hang-tung, Hong Kong's prominent democracy figures and
core members of the Hong Kong Alliance in Support of Patriotic
Democratic Movements of China were arrested and convicted with
``inciting and participating in an unauthorized assembly'' under the
widely-criticized Public Order Ordinance for organizing the June 4th
Candlelight Vigil back in 2020.
COVID-19 restrictions are also used to repress political activities
that do not align with the government's stances. As the world stands in
solidarity with Ukraine against Russia's invasion, three people were
fined by the Hong Kong police for participating in an absolutely
peaceful small-scale pro-Ukraine demonstration.
Free Press
Since the beginning of the pro-democracy movement in 2019,
journalists have been heavily exposed to danger. According to a survey
conducted by the Hong Kong Journalists' Association, of the 222
journalists who responded, only 28 said they had not been treated
violently by the Hong Kong Police Force while covering the movement.
Not only did reporters encounter frequent attacks and harassment from
the police force, they were also threatened by government-backed pro-
Beijing gangs. On July 21, 2019, former journalist Gwyneth HO was
injured while live-streaming coverage of the pro-Beijing gangs'
indiscriminate attack against civilians at Hong Kong's Yuen Long
station. She was struck and knocked to the ground and had to receive
stitches for her wounds. Later on, television producer and journalist
CHOY Yuk-ling, who investigated the Yuen Long incident and exposed
police failures, was convicted and fined.
Starting from 2019, at least 18 journalists have been arrested
while 12 remain in jail awaiting trial. Hong Kong's leading pro-
democracy figure and media tycoon Jimmy LAI is one of them. On August
10, 2020, over 100 police officers raided the office of Apple Daily,
Hong Kong's largest pro-democracy paper and arrested Jimmy LAI, his
sons and numerous senior executives on suspicion of ``colluding with
foreign forces'' under the National Security Law. He was granted bail
and again detained on December 21, 2020. With senior executives jailed
and assets frozen, Apple Daily was forced to close on June 23, 2021.
Following Apple Daily's closure, under mounting political pressure
and continuous assault from the government, almost all independent pro-
democracy media outlets in Hong Kong have been forcibly shut-down. An
increasing number of reporters are fleeing the city.
Access to Internet and Censorship
Online expression and internet access are also under tightening
restrictions. In May 2021, access to several anti-government websites
were found blocked in Hong Kong. Last month, the same happened to our
organization and later on this month, we received a letter from the
city's Police Force, requesting contents related to our ``Free
Political Prisoners'' and ``International Lifeboat'' campaigns to be
removed from the website. With an accusation from the National Security
Bureau of ``colluding with foreign forces to endanger national
security,'' we became the first overseas group to be targeted under the
National Security Law, but we will not be the last.
Fearing date-back charges with the National Security Law, most
independent pro-democracy media outlets have to delta their previous
articles and reportings as they shut down. The only remaining media
outlets have no choice, but to heavily censor themselves to lower the
risks of being targeted and persecuted.
Censorship fears have also foreshadowed the cultural industry.
Tiananmen Massacre themed artwork created by the famous dissident
artist Aiweiwei was taken down and exhibitions were canceled for
obvious political reasons. Last year, the Academy Award ceremony was
banned in Hong Kong as the documentary ``Do Not Split'' which I took
part in was shortlisted for the Best Documentary Short Subject. Earlier
this year, the documentary ``Revolution of Our Times'' came out and
unfortunately, it is also completely inaccessible in Hong Kong.
tibetans and uyghurs' freedom of expression taken away
Although we hear almost nothing in the news about the situation
inside Tibet, according to Freedom House's Freedom in the World 2022
report, Tibet was just ranked--for the second year in a row--as the
least-free country in the world, in a tie with South Sudan and Syria.
This is because Tibet is one of the most strictly-monitored regions in
the world with heavy police presence and surveillance that has created
an almost complete information blackout.
Sadly, we can see how effective this blackout is after a popular
25-year-old Tibetan singer Tsewang Norbu self-immolated in front of the
Potala Palace in Lhasa last month. The Chinese Government quickly took
control of the scene and restricted information from being reported and
circulated. It took Tibetans in exile and human rights groups over 3
weeks to confirm the news and up until now, no photos or videos or any
additional information have been released.
In January, the prominent Tibetan language-rights activist Tashi
Wangchuk--who had just recently been released from 6-years of
imprisonment for speaking out against Beijing's discriminatory language
policies--again courageously spoke out for his people and has been
facing another arrest.
Because Beijing does not allow any foreign media presence in Tibet,
it is incredibly hard and time-consuming for people outside the region
to obtain first-hand information on what is going on there. The
escalating restrictions on freedom of expression, including heavy
censorship and cutting-off the Internet and mobile communications,
makes it almost impossible for the Tibetan people inside Tibet to relay
information to the outside world or even to circulate news among
themselves.
The Chinese Communist regime's ``anti-extremism'' policies in the
Uyghur region is yet another example illustrating the horrific assault
of freedom of expression. With all-round surveillance systems installed
across the region, not only do Uyghurs in the region cannot express
their opinions freely, they cannot express their faith or culture as
well.
Over 1.5 million Uyghurs were arrested for reasons including
practicing their faith, engaging in cultural events, and expressing in
their own Uyghur language, and detained in internment camps,
experiencing political indoctrination, horrendous sexual and physical
abuses, with absolutely no room for free expression.
Prior to his disappearance, Professor Ilham Tohti was a prominent
academic at Beijing's Minzu University. He founded the website Uyghur
Online in 2006 to promote discourse between Han people and the minority
groups in China. He wrote about culture, politics and socioeconomics
and used his platforms to highlight the Uyghurs' plights and to call
for the public's attention to the Chinese Government's systematic
persecution of his people. However, despite the fact that he never
advocated for independence of the Uyghur region or similar ideas, he
was still disappeared by the Chinese Government in 2017 and have been
incommunicado since.
recommendations
As freedom of expression continues to be under assault across Asia,
it is important that the United States fulfill our obligations and
demonstrate leadership in defending our shared beliefs.
Provide Necessary Humanitarian Relocation Channels
As assaults on freedom of expression escalate, it is crucial that
the United States offer necessary humanitarian relocation channels for
people with well-founded fears of persecution, especially the
politically-exposed journalists, activists and protesters.
Enhance Support to Media
The United States should enhance its support to our government-
funded media services, for example, Radio Free Asia with reasonable
resources and increasing fundings to ensure the continuous coverage of
developments in relevant regions. The government should also consider
supporting media agencies proximate to oppressed regions in democratic
countries in Asia, including Taiwan and Japan.
Construct Global Alliance to Defend Free Expression
Beyond individual actions, it is also crucial that the United
States continue to work with like-minded partners and to lead a
multilateral coalition of allies to defend free expression against the
encroachment of authoritarian regimes in a collective manner.
Senator Markey. Excellent, and thank you for all of your
great leadership as well.
We are joined now by Senator Romney, and I do not know if
you would like to make an opening statement right now, Senator.
OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. MITT ROMNEY,
U.S. SENATOR FROM UTAH
Senator Romney. I will ask that my comments be submitted to
the record. I will not have to read them for this group. I am
so late. I apologize for being late and you know what I was up
to, and so I appreciate being able to hear from those that are
testifying today.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
[The prepared statement of Senator Romney follows:]
Prepared Statement of Senator Mitt Romney
Thank you all for your willingness to testify to this committee
today.
The topic that we are discussing today is of great significance to
each of us in this room and to people around the world. That is the
freedom of expression--including the freedom of speech, press,
religion, assembly, and association.
From the beginning of humanity, history was characterized by strong
men assembling the muscle from collaborators to dominate, rule, and
oppress others. They were the feudal lord, Tzar, Caesar, warlord,
Emperor, or king. All were authoritarians, and most of them were
tyrants.
I have a chart in my office that traces the military and economic
might of civilizations from 2,000 BC until today. In the over 4,000
years of human history, dominating civilizations have come and gone.
Only a few short-lived periods of democracy interrupt a virtually
uninterrupted course of authoritarian domination. Authoritarianism is
the default setting of world history, and of the authoritarian regimes
that have prevailed through history one of longest surviving is China.
China, under the rule of the Chinese Communist Party, does not
embrace the rules of the global order, including of freedom of
expression and respect for human rights. It has rejected them and done
the opposite--imprisoning a million Uyghurs in concentration camps;
brutally repressing dissent; censoring the media and Internet;
suppressing the expression of faith and the practice of religion.
And the CCP does not keep within the confines of China's borders.
It obliterated the guarantees it gave to Hong Kong to uphold the one
country, two systems--suppressing democracy and the freedom of the Hong
Kong people. And I fear that Xi Jinping will take a page from Putin's
playbook for conquest to try to invade and exert dominance over the
independent, sovereign nation of Taiwan. I hope that Xi learns from
Ukraine that a free people will not go easily into the night.
We recognize also that China is not the only country where we see
the crackdown on the freedom of expression in Asia, or around the world
generally. The Freedom House assessed that 2020 marked ``the 15th
consecutive year of decline in global freedom'' and that ``nearly 75
percent of the world's population'' live in a country where freedom is
deteriorating.
When America is involved in the world, the world is a safer, freer,
and more prosperous place. We have a responsibility to push back
against the crackdowns on freedom around the world, not only to stand
with those people currently being subjugated but to protect those who
will in the future suffer repression from the Chinese Communist Party
and other authoritarian regimes.
I want to thank our panelists for the time you have taken to be
with us today and for your commitment to freedom and democracy. We look
forward to hearing from you on the issues I have just outlined.
Senator Markey. Excellent, and I thank the senator from
Utah.
Finally, we are going to hear from Ms. Sarah Cook. She is
Research Director for China, Hong Kong, and Taiwan at Freedom
House. At Freedom House she directs the China Media Bulletin, a
monthly digest in English and Chinese providing news and
analysis on media freedom developments related to China.
Her comments and writings have appeared on CNN, Wall Street
Journal, foreign policy, and U.S. Congressional Executive
Commission on China.
So we welcome you, Ms. Cook, and whenever you are ready and
interconnected to the committee we welcome your remarks.
STATEMENT OF SARAH COOK, RESEARCH DIRECTOR FOR CHINA, HONG
KONG, AND TAIWAN, FREEDOM HOUSE, WASHINGTON, DC
Ms. Cook. Senator Markey, Senator Romney, thank you very
much for the opportunity to testify. I do apologize that I am
unable to join you in person.
Given the title of this hearing, it will not come as a
surprise that the most notable trend related to freedom of
expression in Asia is how much it is declining.
Data from Freedom House shows this shrinking space is not
limited to a small number of countries or only part of the
region. It cuts across subregions and across different forms of
expression, affecting press freedom, internet freedom, academic
freedom, and religious freedom in both democracies and
authoritarian regimes.
Over the past 5 years, 12 out of 15 countries in Asia
assessed in our ``Freedom on the Net'' report experienced
declines in internet freedom.
Other notable trends are, one, the adoption and enforcement
of new restrictive legislation, including in China, India,
Myanmar, and, as Maria mentioned, the Philippines; two, severe
legal penalties for online and offline expression, including
prison terms of 15, 43 years, or even life imprisonment in
Vietnam, Thailand, and China; and three, the disproportionate
impact on ethnic and religious communities, who are often more
severely punished or censored than the country's broader
population.
In China, for example, alongside Uighurs and Tibetans,
Inner Mongolians, Christians, and practitioners of Falun Gong
often face greater censorship and harsher legal penalties than
other citizens.
So what is driving these declines? First, the COVID-19
pandemic has played a vital role as governments across the
democratic spectrum in Asia have resorted to excessive
surveillance and used duress to crackdown on free speech during
COVID.
COVID is only one factor. Other contributing factors will
actually extend long beyond the pandemic. First, elections and
other political leadership transitions tend to invite increased
restrictions on speech both online and offline.
Second, locations that have faced the greatest declines in
recent years had experienced mass protest movements pushing
back against repression, which were then cracked down upon,
including in Myanmar and Hong Kong.
Third, more sophisticated and pervasive surveillance
technologies facilitate identification and prosecution of
political opponents and ordinary citizens who share disfavored
information on various topics.
So what has been the role of China in all of this? As the
world's largest authoritarian regime and a major economic
power, the Chinese Communist Party's ability to itself
construct the world's most sophisticated and multi-layered
apparatus of information control has demonstrated that such a
project is possible and it has played a role in normalizing
digital repression.
More directly, Beijing's own media influence include
exercising control over diaspora media, engaging in
disinformation campaigns in Taiwan, but also the Philippines,
and using control over digital television networks built by
Chinese firms in Cambodia to provide advantageous access to
Chinese state television.
As China-based social media platforms and news aggregators
grow in popularity in the region, the vulnerability of users to
manipulation from Beijing intensifies.
In addition, a recent study found that at least 11
countries in Asia had signed ``smart city'' or ``safe city''
project agreements with Chinese vendors in 2013. Almost all are
rated partly free or not free by Freedom House, heightening the
likelihood that such surveillance technology could be used
against local opponents and civic activists.
Still, when considering Beijing's influence on human rights
and freedom of expression in Asia, in many instances the most
pernicious effects can be how PRC-based actors strengthen local
illiberal actors, pressing on the scales to tilt the balance in
a more authoritarian direction.
The news is not all bad and the future of freedom of
expression in Asia is very much contested. Alongside the worst
abusers of media and internet freedom, Asia is also home to
some of the world's freest press and internet freedom
landscapes, including Japan and Taiwan.
Moreover, throughout the region, journalists, independent
news outlets, civil society groups, and also judges are playing
a critical role in defending free expression.
Looking ahead, politically sensitive contexts could trigger
new threats, domestic and foreign, including elections in the
Philippines and local elections in Taiwan, and, of course,
China's own 20th Party Congress in November where Xi Jinping
will seek a controversial third term.
Russia's invasion of Ukraine will also have reverberations.
Even indirect effects due to problems in the global economy
could drive street protests and, in response, government
crackdowns.
In China, although the regime has superficially claimed
neutrality, its state media have been feeding local audiences
pro-Russian propaganda and disinformation, including virulently
anti-American narratives, while aggressively censoring content
departing from the official party line.
In terms of recommendations, the U.S. Government should,
one, consistently address threats to free expression and urge
release of imprisoned journalists as part of high-level
bilateral engagement, including in democracies and with allies.
Two, focus funding for free expression on efforts that will
sustain operations, evade censorship, support legal advocacy,
and address political crises.
Three, Congress should reauthorize the Global Magnitsky Act
with language that codifies the serious human rights abuse
standards. Congress should also adopt legislation creating an
emergency visa for journalists, as bills like the International
Press Freedom Act would do.
In our work at Freedom House we see firsthand how steps
like these can have real-world impact.
I would like to conclude with a comment that actually one
of our readers of the China Media Bulletin inside China shared
in a survey.
``I am a lower class worker in Chinese society and I do
not speak English. An independent Chinese media like
you that does in-depth reports about the situation in
China gives me a better understanding of China's
current situation and future developments.
``China is the largest authoritarian country in the
world. The Chinese Communist Party oppresses its
citizens, blocks information flows, and also threatens
the existing world order. I think the flow of
information and freedom of speech are very important to
China's future development.
``Birds in cages long to fly. Even if we cannot fly out
now, hearing the chirping of birds outside can still
give us hope and faith,''
Thank you very much.
[The prepared statement of Ms. Cook follows:]
Prepared Statement of Ms. Sarah Cook
introduction
Senator Markey, Senator Romney, and members of the Subcommittee,
thank you very much for the opportunity to speak to you on this topic
that affects billions of people and with such incredible co-panelists.
I apologize for being unable to join you in person.
In this testimony, I plan to address six dimensions of today's
topic, specifically:
1. Key trends for freedom of expression in Asia
2. COVID-19 and other factors driving declines
3. The role of China
4. The bright spots
5. What to watch for in the coming year
6. Recommendations for U.S. policy
key trends for freedom of expression in asia
Given the title of this hearing, it will not be a surprise that the
most notable trend related to freedom of expression in Asia is how much
it is declining. This shrinking space is not limited to a small number
of countries or only part of the region. It cuts across subregions,
across regime types, and across different forms of expression,
affecting press freedom, internet freedom, academic freedom, religious
freedom, private discussion, and freedom of assembly in both
democracies and authoritarian regimes. Data from Freedom House's
Freedom in World and Freedom on the Net reports confirm what many
observers sense intuitively:
In the 2022 edition of Freedom in the World 5 out of 29
countries and territories in Asia experienced a decline on free
expression-related indicators, none showed improvement. These
locations were Myanmar, Afghanistan, the Philippines,
Singapore, and Hong Kong.
In the 2021 edition of Freedom on the Net 6 out of 16
countries assessed in Asia experienced a decline in internet
freedom: Bangladesh, India, Indonesia, Myanmar, Pakistan, and
Sri Lanka (Afghanistan and Hong Kong are not assessed in
Freedom on the Net)
These declines are not limited to 1 year, looking at the
past 5 years--12 out of 15 countries in the region scored lower
in 2021 than they did in the 2016 edition of Freedom of the
Net.
The assault on freedom of expression in the region has taken
numerous forms, but three dynamics stand out as having occurred in
multiple countries across the region, and indeed, around the globe:
1. Adoption and enforcement of new restrictive legislation:
Governments in 7 out of the 16 Asian countries assessed in
Freedom on the Net pursued new rules for tech companies on
content, data, and competition between June 2020 and May 2021.
While some of these pieces of legislation aimed to better
protect users, many of them--like those in China, India,
Indonesia, Myanmar, and the Philippines--increased censorship
or punishment of users for online expression. In Hong Kong,
which is not independently assessed in Freedom on the Net, the
new National Security Law forced on the territory by Beijing in
June 2020 increased criminalization of political speech and
independent reporting dramatically, resulting in dozens of
prosecutions, shuttered news outlets, and fleeing journalists.
2. Severe legal penalties for online and offline expression: These
new laws and pre-existing regulations have been deployed to
punish a wide range of expression online and offline. This
includes posts, videos, and publications related to electoral
campaigns, political protests, or criticism of top leaders, but
also about topics like public health, religious faith, and
mundane daily communications. The lengths of sentences handed
down in some cases is striking, exceeding 10 years. Many of
those sentences subsequently suffer bodily harm in custody due
to torture, poor conditions, or denial of medical treatment,
sometimes resulting in death. For example:
a. Authorities in Thailand sentenced a former revenue officer to
a staggering 43 years in prison. She was convicted of
violating the country's draconian lese-majeste laws by
criticizing the monarchy in social media posts.
b. In Vietnam, a journalist for an online news outlet was
sentenced to 15 years in jail. The government charged him
with disseminating anti-state propaganda in his articles.
c. In China, in July 2020, property tycoon and CCP member Ren
Zhiqiang was sentenced to 18 years in prison after
publishing an online critique of Xi Jinping's response to
the pandemic.
Although these are some of the most egregious examples, the
problem is regionwide. In 15 out of 16 Asian countries assessed
in Freedom on the Net 2021, an internet user was sentenced to
prison for political or social content. In 10 countries, a
blogger or internet user was physically attacked or killed,
including in custody. Even in more democratic settings,
citizens face legal reprisals for their activism. An
environmental activist in India was arrested for sedition in
February 2021 because she shared a Google Doc on social media
on how to support a protest movement for farmers' rights, a
crime that carries a maximum penalty of life imprisonment.
3. Disproportionate impact on ethnic and religious communities: In
many countries in the region, even as crackdowns have occurred
that affect the entire population, measures taken to restrict
and punish expression often targets marginalized ethnic and
religious communities more severely.
a. In China, censorship and surveillance is more stringent in
ethnic minority regions like Xinjiang and Tibet, while
content about these and banned religious groups like Falun
Gong that departs from the official narrative is
consistently and systematically censored throughout China.
Over the past year, app stores have tightened restrictions
on Tibetan and Uyghur languages, as well as ones with
content from the Bible. New regulations that went into
effect on March 1 ban the transmission of religious content
online without a government licenses. Legal penalties are
also especially harsh. Many of the over 1 million Uyghurs
held in mass detention or forced labor facilities were
detained due to their online activities, including being
sentenced to over 15 years in prison for simply
communicating with Uyghurs outside the country. In February
2021, Tibetan Kunchok Jinpa died in a Lhasa hospital while
serving a 21-year prison sentence for ``leaking state
secrets'' after being detained in 2013 for providing
information to overseas websites about protests in Tibet.
Numerous Falun Gong practitioners throughout China have
been jailed in recent years for up to 12 years for posting
messages about the spiritual group or human rights abuses
on social media, accessing banned websites, possessing or
sharing prohibited VPN technology, or simply speaking to
fellow citizens in public places.
b. Prior to the coup in Myanmar, the government had imposed one
of the world's longest internet disruptions at a
subnational level. Between June 2019 and February 2021, the
authorities cut off mobile internet for over a million
people in parts of Rakhine State and Chin State--areas
where the military has conducted crackdowns, first against
the Rohingya, and more recently against the Rakhine ethnic
group. The government had also launched a campaign of
censorship and surveillance targeting activists and
journalist who covered the Rohingya crisis.
c. The Indian Government frequently restricts internet access in
Jammu and Kashmir. For example, between August 2019 and
January 2020, the state administration ordered the longest
internet shutdown in India--a total of 213 days. This
followed the Indian Government's abrogation of Article 370
of the Indian Constitution, which provides special status
to the state.
d. In Indonesia, internet disruptions in the Papua region were
reported on three separate occasions that coincided with
events related to Papuan independence in 2020 and 2021.
Members of civil society suspect that these disruptions may
have been deliberate and ordered by the government, though
the government or telecommunication providers have not
confirmed this.
notable declines in key countries
Although declines in free expression have occurred in multiple
countries in Asia, four stand out for the scale and significance of
deterioration:
China, including Hong Kong: China is home to the most sophisticated
and multi-layered apparatus of information control in the world. In the
latest addition of Freedom on the Net, the government was the worst
abuser of internet freedom for the seventh consecutive year. China's
own score has declined from 17 to only 10 out of 100 points over the
past decade, reflecting how much more repressive and restrictive
China's authoritarian regime has become in recent years. The ruling
Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has tightened its control over the state
bureaucracy, the media, online speech, religious groups, universities,
businesses, and civil society associations, and it has undermined its
own already modest rule-of-law reforms. Ordinary users continue to face
severe legal repercussions for activities like sharing news stories,
talking about their religious beliefs, or communicating with family
members and others overseas. Authorities have also yielded their
immense power over the tech industry through new legislation,
regulatory investigations, and administrative fines for alleged misuse
of data or insufficient enforcement of censorship protocols. The
closure of space for independent media and free expression has been
much more dramatic in Hong Kong, where journalists and internet users
had previously enjoyed a significantly greater degree of freedom than
their Mainland counterparts. The implementation of the National
Security Law (NSL) since its adoption in 2020 has amounted to a
multifront attack on Hong Kong's previous autonomy and fundamental
freedoms. The territory's most prominent prodemocracy figures have been
arrested under its provisions, and NSL charges or the threat of charges
have resulted in the closure of dozens of political parties, major
independent news outlets, peaceful nongovernmental organizations
(NGOs), and unions. The territory's score on Freedom in the World has
dropped 12 points (falling from a 55/100 to 43/100) over the 2 years
since the NSL was adopted.
India: Although India is a multiparty democracy--the world's
largest--the government led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his
Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has presided over
discriminatory policies and a rise in persecution affecting the Muslim
population. The constitution guarantees civil liberties including
freedom of expression and freedom of religion, but harassment of
journalists, nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), and other government
critics has increased significantly under Modi, who assumed the
premiership in 2014. Internet controls have also increased. Internet
access was cut off repeatedly throughout January and February 2021 as
farmers took to the streets to express their opposition to agricultural
reform bills. One shutdown in Delhi affected more than 50 million
mobile subscribers. A new law adopted in February 2021 requires major
social media platforms to comply with takedown orders about a broad
array of content from a court or government authority within 36 hours
or face criminal liability. The law also requires major social media
platforms to use AI-based moderation tools to monitor users' posts and
appoint three in-country representatives. In the 2021 edition of
Freedom in the World, India's status declined from Free to Partly Free
as a result of changes to the legal framework that increased
punishments for citizens engaging in critical discussion online.
Myanmar: After years of improvements and cautious hope, the
February 2021 coup brought the junta and its abuses back in full force.
Internet freedom plummeted by 14 points in Myanmar--the largest 1-year
decline ever recorded in Freedom on the Net--after the military refused
to accept the results of the November 2020 general elections and
launched a deadly coup in February 2021. Internet connectivity was cut
off every night from then until April. Mobile services were suspended
entirely beginning in March, leaving only fixed-line and wireless
broadband services available to users during the day. After opposition
to the coup gathered force online and overflowed into the streets, the
junta also blocked social media, stripped the licenses of independent
online news outlets, forced service providers to hand over personal
data, and seized control of the telecommunications infrastructure.
Protesters and ordinary users alike suffered physical assaults and
enforced disappearances in retaliation for their online activities.
Afghanistan: Afghanistan's elected government, which had been
undermined by an insurgency waged by the Taliban as well as violence,
corruption, and flawed electoral processes, nevertheless offered a wide
range of individual rights. However, it collapsed in August 2021 as the
United States withdrew its military presence in the country and the
Taliban overthrew the elected government. Since taking power, the
Taliban has closed the country's political space and opposition to its
rule is not tolerated. In September, it reconstituted a Ministry of
Vice and Virtue (MVV), which had enforced their interpretation of
Sharia (Islamic law) under their previous regime. The new regime has
also violently suppressed demonstrations, restricted private discussion
perceived as critical of its rule, limited educational opportunities
for female students, and targeted supporters of the former government.
Its score on Freedom in the World dropped 7 points (from 17/100 to 10/
100) in 2021.
covid-19 and other factors driving declines
What is driving these declines? Given what has occurred around the
world over the past 2 years, it is evident that the COVID-19 pandemic
has played a vital role.
As COVID-19 spread globally throughout 2020 and 2021, governments
across the democratic spectrum in Asia and elsewhere repeatedly
resorted to excessive surveillance, discriminatory restrictions on
freedoms like movement and assembly, and arbitrary or violent
enforcement of such restrictions by police and nonstate actors.
Governments throughout the region increasingly used arrests to crack
down on free speech during the COVID-19 pandemic. Indirectly, the
pandemic allowed authoritarian forces to further consolidate their
control of government institutions, setting the stage for these forces
to more easily restrict expression, speech, and assembly in the future:
In India, the government's response to COVID-19 included
encouraging the scapegoating of Muslims, who were
disproportionately blamed for the spread of the virus and faced
attacks by vigilante mobs.
In the Philippines, amidst of a heavy-handed lockdown in
2021, the authorities stepped up harassment and arrests of
social media users, including those who criticized the
government's pandemic response.
Cambodia's authoritarian Prime Minister, Hun Sen, presided
over the arrests of numerous people for allegedly spreading
false information linked to the virus and criticizing the
state's performance.
In Indonesia, military figures were appointed to leading
positions on the country's COVID-19 task force, and the armed
services provided essential support in developing emergency
hospitals and securing medical supplies. In recent years,
observers have raised concerns about the military's growing
influence over civilian governance, and its heavy involvement
in the health crisis threatened to accelerate this trend.
In Sri Lanka, the government of Prime Minister Mahinda
Rajapaksa stepped up efforts to control independent reporting
and unfavorable speech by ordering the arrest of anyone who
criticizes or contradicts the official line on the coronavirus.
In China, alongside broad censorship and intensified
surveillance, hundreds of people were arrested for speech
relating to COVID-19. For instance, a Shanghai court sentenced
lawyer turned citizen journalist Zhang Zhan in December 2020 to
4 years in prison for ``picking quarrels and provoking
trouble.'' Zhang had covered the COVID-19 outbreak in Wuhan.
She had uploaded more than 120 videos to YouTube prior to her
arrest in May 2020. Jailings linked to COVID-19 have continued
into 2022. Xu Na, a Falun Gong practitioner and artist whose
husband was killed in police custody in 2008, was sentenced to
8 years in prison in January for sharing information about the
state of the pandemic in Beijing in the run-up to the Winter
Olympics.
Beyond COVID-19, three other factors have also contributed to the
decline in meaningful ways, all of which will extend beyond the
pandemic:
1. Elections and other political leadership transitions: Freedom
House's research has repeatedly found that restrictions on
speech--both online and offline--tend to escalate before and
during crucial moments of political crises, including pivotal
electoral contests and authoritarian leadership transitions.
These include intensified arrests of political and civic
activists, blocked websites, internet shutdowns, cyberattacks,
and both domestic and cross-border disinformation campaigns. A
Freedom on the Net analysis of elections held between June 2018
and May 2020 found that among countries in Asia, domestic
digital interference in elections had occurred in Bangladesh,
Cambodia, India, Indonesia, Pakistan, the Philippines, Sri
Lanka, and Thailand. There is a long track-record in China of
internet controls intensifying around sensitive political
anniversaries or leadership transitions, such as the 5-year
party congresses. Even after electoral or other factional
contests end, as leaders consolidate their political power--
including with strong parliamentary majorities in democratic
settings--they may be emboldened by the reduced risk of
pushback for cracking down on dissent and wish to take
advantage of the opportunity before the next moment of
political contestation.
2. Repressive responses to mass protest movements: Several of the
locations that have faced the greatest pressure on free
expression in recent years had experienced mass protest
movements calling for political change or challenging proposed
or enacted repressive policies. These include more closed
political regimes like in Thailand and Myanmar, mid-range
performers like Hong Kong, and democracies like India and
Indonesia.
3. Increasing surveillance facilitating prosecutions: As more
sophisticated and pervasive surveillance technologies
proliferate in the region, this facilitates crackdowns on
dissent. Political opponents, activists and ordinary citizens
who share disfavored news or commentary on political, social,
and religious topics are more likely to be identified and
prosecuted than previously. What could have slipped through the
cracks before, no longer does, making it easier for security
forces and prosecutors to detain, arrest, and sentence citizens
for non-conforming speech that previously would have escaped
punishment. This is evident from the details of individual
cases, including court verdicts that cite private online
communications or video surveillance in public places as
evidence used for convictions.
the role of china
As noted above, many of the factors driving declines in the region
relate to broader domestic or even global dynamics. Nevertheless, as
the world's largest authoritarian regime and a major economic power in
the region, the Chinese party-state and related actors do have an
impact on free expression beyond China's borders and throughout the
region. This is evident in several ways:
Beijing's own media influence activities abroad: In January
2020, Freedom House published a report entitled Beijing's
Global Megaphone, which outlined the toolbox deployed by the
CCP, state media, and various proxies to influence news
reporting around the world via propaganda, disinformation,
censorship, and control over content dissemination
infrastructure. The study found that hundreds of millions of
people around the world and in multiple languages are consuming
news influenced by CCP narratives and direction, often without
being aware of the party-state origins. There are numerous
cases from across Asia that illustrate this phenomenon and how
it affects news consumed by residents: Xinhua content-sharing
agreements in multiple countries, strong influence over
Chinese-language media serving the diaspora, CCP anti-poverty
propaganda placements appearing in Indonesia, a dismantled
Facebook disinformation campaign in the Philippines that
promoted politicians favorable to China, multiple sophisticated
disinformation campaigns targeting Taiwan (including ones
attempting to influence electoral outcomes), prosecution in
Thailand of a man for aiding uncensored radio broadcasts into
China, and advantageous access to Chinese state television
stations on digital television networks built by Chinese firms
in Cambodia. Freedom House is currently working on a new
project to map Beijing's global media influence and local
resilience in 30 countries, including six in Asia. The report,
with accompanying scores and in-depth country case studies will
be published in September 2022.
Export of surveillance equipment: Although Chinese firms
like Huawei, ZTE, Dahua and others sell their products,
including sophisticated and artificial-intelligence driven
surveillance technologies, to governments worldwide, they have
also found an eager market in Asia. A study by RWR Advisory, a
Washington-based advisory, whose findings were analyzed in a
June 2021 report published in the Financial Times found that at
least 11 countries in Asia had signed ``smart city'' or ``safe
city'' project agreements with Chinese equipment vendors since
2013. Other than South Korea, which is rated Free, the other 10
countries are rated as either Partly Free or Not Free in
Freedom in the World. According to the data, India had signed
the largest number of contracts, estimated at 10. Other
countries in the region with at least one contract were
Bangladesh, Cambodia, Indonesia, Malaysia, Myanmar, Pakistan,
the Philippines, Sri Lanka, and Thailand. As noted elsewhere in
this testimony, many of these countries have experienced
increased political, media, and information restrictions in
recent years, heightening the likelihood that these
technologies could be used by political leaders to monitor,
identify, and punish opponents, civic activists, or other
government critics.
Normalization of digital repression: By constructing the
world's most sophisticated and multi-layered apparatus of
information control, the CCP has demonstrated that such a
project is possible. Even as other authoritarian leaders in the
region and beyond may not always have the technical prowess and
resources to fully mirror Beijing's controls, there are
examples of them appearing to attempt it. This has been evident
in recent years in Cambodia, where the government is seeking to
centralize internet infrastructure in order to expand its
technical capacity for censorship; and in Vietnam with the
Cybersecurity Law and the decision of the Communist Party's
general secretary to pursue a third term, similar to what his
Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping will be doing this November.
More broadly, the 2018 edition of Freedom on the Net found that
in addition to Cambodia and Vietnam, five other countries in
the region (the Philippines, Singapore, Myanmar, Indonesia, and
Thailand) had sent media elites or government officials for
trainings in China on new media or information management. Such
trainings have slowed during the pandemic but are likely to
pick up frequency again in the coming years.
When considering Beijing's influence on human rights and freedom of
expression in Asia, it is important to consider the agency and role of
local political actors. Some actions by Beijing are direct in their
impact on citizens of other countries. But often, the influence is
indirect. In many instances, the most pernicious effects can be how
PRC-based actors collaborate with or strengthen local illiberal actors
in the political, security, or media sector, pressing on the scales to
tilt the balance in a less democratic, more authoritarian direction.
This dynamic and the ability of local media and civil society to push
back against such collaboration vary in form and magnitude depending on
a country's own level of freedom and democratic governance.
the bright spots
The news is not all bad. There are several more optimistic trends
that demonstrate the extent to which the future trajectory for free
expression in Asia is very much contested. Four points are worth
highlighting:
Strong performing countries: Alongside the worst abuser of
media and internet freedom globally, Asia is also home to some
of the world's freest press and internet freedom landscapes--
notably Japan and Taiwan, which scored 76/100 and 80/100,
respectively in the 2021 edition of Freedom on the Net. In both
democracies, there are few obstacles to internet access, a lack
of website blocks, and a legal framework and independent
judiciary that provide strong protections for various forms of
expression. People can freely use the internet to mobilize, and
netizens regularly do so. In Taiwan, civil society, the tech
sector, and the government have taken innovative action to
counteract the impact of disinformation campaigns originating
from China. Both did register some gaps, however, with reports
emerging in Japan of online harassment and intimidation,
particularly against women, individuals with at least one Black
parent, and medical personnel. In Taiwan, besides the effects
of information warfare from China, criminal prosecutions for
online activities and concerns over disproportionate
surveillance are viewed as potential threats to internet
freedom. Although rated Party Free, South Korea is another
regional democracy with a relatively high degree of internet
freedom (67/100 on Freedom on the Net 2021). Moreover, both
Japan and South Korea have registered a three-point score
improvement since 2019, despite the pressures placed on
internet freedom by the COVID-19 pandemic.
Role and resilience of civil society: Journalists,
independent news outlets, and various civil society groups are
playing a critical role in defending free expression. In more
democratic settings, press and internet freedom NGOs, academic
institutions, and grassroots activists investigate and expose
violations of free expression, advocate for passage of
protective laws and against adoption of restrictive
legislation, and seek innovative responses to emerging threats,
at times collaborating effectively with the private sector as
well as government agencies. Even in countries led by brutal
regimes, citizens continue to speak out against abuses, taking
action to try to protect others in their society and enhance
freedom, often at risk to their own freedom, lives, and
families. In Vietnam, candidates in tightly controlled
elections posted videos online declaring a desire to represent
other citizens knowing they would be detained and likely
imprisoned as a result. In Myanmar, civic protest and
resilience have meant that the junta has been unable to fully
legitimize its rule and consolidate power. In China, much of
what is known about vital topics such as the early days of the
COVID-19 pandemic in Wuhan, the scale and nature of mass
internment of Uyghur, Kazakh, and other minorities in Xinjiang,
and ever-expanding restrictions on freedom in Hong Kong is due
in large part to reporting by local journalists, citizen
reporters, and refugees who have spoken out despite threats to
family still in China.
Protection by courts: In many countries, the courts have
served as a bulwark to growing restrictions on freedom,
upholding free expression and at times, overturning repressive
legislation. In January 2020, India's Supreme Court ruled that
internet access is a human right, in an order that imposed some
constraints on internet shutdowns across the country but did
not bar them outright. In Japan, courts have upheld strict
criteria for delisting search results on major platforms.
Courts in South Korea overturned a law that required people to
register with their real names to comment online during
elections periods, affirming the importance of online
anonymity. Though Thailand's judiciary suffers from
politicization, corruption, and lack of independence, the
courts have rejected several government requests to block
content critical of the authorities, such as an online outlet
broadcasting footage of the youth-led antigovernment protests.
Several of these cases were pushed forward by civil society
groups working with lawyers to proactively seek legal avenues
to defend online rights.
Limits of Beijing's influence: While Beijing's growing
investment in foreign media influence has yielded some gains,
the campaign has also encountered obstacles such as
journalistic integrity and public skepticism about state-run
media. In fact, the past 4 years have featured a wave of
pushback. In many countries, including in Asia, governmental
and nongovernmental actors alike have come to recognize the
threat that CCP media influence poses to democratic freedoms
and structures. Resistance has come from the media industry
itself, as well as policymakers, the technology sector, and
civil society. In terms of public opinion, surveys and academic
studies indicate that in the initial years of state media
expansion, views on China and Xi Jinping personally improved,
including in parts of Asia. Since 2015, however, the percentage
of the population expressing a favorable view of China in Pew
surveys has declined--sometimes precipitously--in influential
regional players like Indonesia, the Philippines, and India.
Although it is difficult to isolate the precise cause, the dip
has coincided with Beijing's more aggressive actions in the
South China Sea and its border with India, the regime's program
of mass detention in Xinjiang, and the PRC Government's
dramatic moves to curtail freedom and autonomy in Hong Kong.
looking ahead
As we look ahead to the coming year and beyond, several occurrences
could further exacerbate the pressure on media and internet freedom in
Asia. Any actions that local authorities, civil society and foreign
actors like businesses and democratic governments can take to pre-
emptively prepare for these would maximize protection for free
expression and limit the effects of predictable restrictions.
Upcoming politically sensitive contests: Several democracies
in the region have elections scheduled for this year that could
heighten domestic crackdowns and disinformation campaigns, as
well as potential foreign interference, including from China.
Events to watch for are the Philippines' elections in May over
who will succeed current President Rodrigo Duterte; India's
presidential elections in July, alongside local elections
throughout the year; and Taiwan's local and municipal elections
in November. The last set of these elections in 2018 were the
focus of Beijing's first aggressive, and arguably successful,
disinformation operation to influence electoral outcomes in
Taiwan. Notably, this year's polls coincide with the Communist
Party in China's own 20th Party Congress, where Xi Jinping will
seek--and barring an unexpected crisis, be approved for--a
controversial third term.
Reverberations from Russia's invasion of Ukraine: Although
the countries of Asia are geographically far from Ukraine,
Russia's invasion of the country and its economic
reverberations are already reaching the region. Countries like
Bangladesh are feeling the pinch in their energy and food
supplies. Others are indirectly impacted by the negative
effects on the global economy, such as reduced exports and
market volatility. Should the invasion negatively affect
economic performance in the region or raise prices on vital
commodities like energy and food, this could drive public
outcries and street protests. As noted above, when political
leaders are put on the defensive by civic mobilization, some
have responded with stronger restrictions on assembly,
independent media, and internet freedom, including via
localized network blackouts. In China, the regime has
superficially claimed neutrality, but its state media have been
feeding local audiences pro-Russian propaganda and
disinformation, including virulently anti-American narratives,
while aggressively censoring content departing from the
official party line, including video broadcasts by a Chinese
citizen residing in Ukraine. This manipulation further
reinforces the information isolation of Chinese news consumers
relative to the rest of the world and can radicalize perception
of the United State and the threat it could pose to China. On
the other hand, Russia's invasion has offered a case study for
how a unified strong response from Western and some Asian
democracies is possible, as well as how challenging an invasion
of Taiwan could be militarily and economically for China.
Beijing's influence over tech and content dissemination
infrastructure: China-based companies with close ties to the
CCP and often a track record of politicized surveillance and
censorship within China are playing a meaningful role in the
technological infrastructure of many countries in the region.
This spans not only telecom infrastructure, like Huawei routers
in 4G and 5G mobile phone networks, but also digital television
in countries like Cambodia, Laos, Pakistan, and East Timor.
Importantly, social media platforms like Tencent's WeChat and
Bytedance's TikTok are immensely popular, while news
aggregators owned by China-based companies have also gained a
notable footprint in countries like Indonesia. Sporadic
investigations in recent years have revealed that in some
instances at least, this infrastructural control has been used
to amplify pro-Beijing content or subdue disfavored voices or
content providers. To date, these attempts have not been
systematic or widespread and some have been reversed following
exposure. But as Beijing's footprint expands, China's regime
increases pressure on its own tech sector at home, and
authoritarian leaders in the region seek tools to suppress
political opposition, the control by China-based companies over
key nodes in the information flow could be activated to
threaten free expression in much broader and politically
significant ways.
recommendations
The United States and various agencies already employ various
diplomatic, programmatic, and other measures to support free
expression, independent media, and internet freedom in Asia.
Nevertheless, the scale, severity, and urgency of the problem requires
more attention and resources, not only monetary. The enormity and
complexity of the challenge requires strategic thinking. Authoritarian
regimes like China's have proven adept at thinking two steps ahead,
building structures of influence and economic leverage that can be
activated later to serve their agenda. The United States and other
democratic governments need to be thinking in similarly calculated
ways, proactively responding and preparing BEFORE crises happen. The
following are several recommendations for actions that the United
States Government--including Congress--can take to protect and advance
freedom of expression in Asia.
1. Address threats to independent media, internet freedom and free
expression as part of high-level bilateral engagement: U.S.
officials traveling to the region, should consistently raise
the issues of press freedom and internet freedom in public and
in private meetings with their counterparts, including at the
highest levels. In these interactions, U.S. officials should:
a. Urge the release of imprisoned journalists and free
expression activists. Even where such pressure may not
secure their release, it is likely to improve treatment in
custody and reduce the risk of torture.
b. Raise concerns about any pending legislation that could
intensify censorship, surveillance, or criminal penalties
for political, social, and religious topics.
c. Voice concerns over restrictions on free expression during
meetings and trips related to economic and security policy,
including by officials such as the Secretaries of Treasury,
Commerce, and Defense, addressing the financial and
security implications of reduced free expression.
d. Explore avenues for speaking to publics in Asia directly.
Communicate factual information and policy statements
directly to local audiences via social media posts, ``town
hall'' meetings, and embassy websites. When leaders visit
the region, insist on unimpeded foreign media access and
opportunities to speak to domestic media without filters.
2. Focus support for independent media and civil society on efforts
that will sustain operations, evade censorship, and preserve
the public record:
a. As part of the United States' Summit for Democracy
commitments, several promising new initiatives were
announced, including a multi-donor International Fund for
Public Interest Media and a Media Viability Accelerator.
These should be used, along with other available funding,
to scale up efforts to support independent media in Asia--
including public-interest journalism and exile media--
through financial assistance and innovative financing
models, technical support, skills training, and mentoring.
b. Another initiative announced at the Summit--a Multilateral
Surge and Sustain Fund for Anti-Censorship Technology--
should be used to expand funding for groups that develop
and disseminate tools to enable uses to securely access
blocked websites, including from mobile phones. This fund
should also deploy opportunities for emergency funding to
civil society and media outlets for rapid activation ahead
of or during moments of crisis or political turmoil when
threats to free expression and citizen demand for credible
information typically spike.
c. Funding for media freedom should also support efforts to
monitor, preserve, and recirculate censored content within
countries that have high levels of censorship, including
news articles and social media posts on political, social,
and religious topics that have been deleted.
d. Funding should also include programs that provide support for
legal advocacy and public interest lawyering on these
issues, including trainings for civil society on best and
worst practices for online content regulation.
e. U.S. Government efforts should support research and
monitoring initiatives, including on how emerging
technologies are and could negatively impact freedom of
expression. These should also include efforts to track
control exercised by China-based companies over content
infrastructure abroad and how or if this is being used to
amplify or marginalize certain content or information
providers in alignment with CCP priorities.
3. Deploy targeted sanctions for egregious abuses and provide
funding for vetting: Utilize targeted sanctions as part of a
comprehensive strategy of accountability for human rights
abusers, including those engaged in violations against
journalists, internet users, and religious believers. Such
sanctions are not a standalone solution, but they remain a
powerful mechanism for deterring harmful behavior and reducing
impunity. Multilateral sanctions are most effective. Whenever
possible, the United States should coordinate its efforts and
jointly impose sanctions on perpetrators alongside other
democratic nations for maximum impact, as has been done in
recent cases related to Myanmar, Hong Kong, and Xinjiang.
a. The Global Magnitsky Human Rights Accountability Act (22 USC
2656 note), which allows for visa bans and asset freezes on
individuals and entities engaged in human rights abuses and
corruption, has been one of the United States' most
impactful sanctions regimes. Congress should pass S.93,
which eliminates the December 23, 2022, sunset and codifies
key portions of Executive Order 13818, which enables the
United States to impose sanctions for ``serious human
rights abuses.'' This term encompasses a greater number of
abuses than the more restrictive threshold of ``gross
violations of human rights,'' the standard included in the
Global Magnitsky Act in its original form.
b. Global Magnitsky is one of the most powerful targeted
sanctions options, but country-specific regimes, and visa
bans under section 7031(c) of the State Department
appropriations bill or the Immigration and Nationality Act
can also be impactful, as can targeted sanctions options
for countries designated as religious freedom violators or
countries of concern under the International Religious
Freedom Act.
c. The U.S. Congress and Executive Branch should work together
to ensure robust funding for the enforcement of targeted
sanctions programs. The U.S. Department of the Treasury,
Department of State, and Department of Justice all collect
information about suspected perpetrators of abuses who are
eligible for sanctions. Unfortunately, the number of
potential sanctions cases to be vetted by the U.S.
Government exceeds current capacity. Congress has provided
funding for sanctions implementation and enforcement, but
funding for additional staff would help reduce the backlog
of cases that have yet to be vetted.
4. Pass legislation focused on advancing press freedom globally.
Freedom House would particularly urge consideration of two
bills with broader relevance: the Global Press Freedom Act
(S.204) introduced by Senators Brian Schatz (D-HI) with support
from Todd Young (R-IN) and the International Press Freedom Act
(S.1495), introduced by Senator Tim Kaine (D-VA) with support
from Senator Lindsey Graham (R-SC). Both are bipartisan bills
that would help prioritize press freedom within U.S. foreign
policy, including in Asia. They would create an office focused
on press freedom in the Department of State, and S.1495 adds
special visas and funding for journalists at risk.
conclusion
Despite the ever-escalating efforts to restrict journalists and
limit citizens' access to information throughout Asia, steps like those
cited above by the United States and other international actors can
have a real-world impact, a dynamic Freedom House has observed
repeatedly in our work. I have personally interviewed several prisoners
from China who were the subject of rescue campaigns and testified to
better treatment, less torture in custody, and sometimes early release
thanks to international pressure.
In addition, as part of the China Media Bulletin project, we have
been working with organizations who run circumvention tools that garner
millions of impressions each month and bring tens of thousands of
readers from inside China to the bulletin. This is just one example of
the eagerness with which a notable contingent of people in Asia--even
in one of the region's most repressive environments--are actively
seeking out uncensored, credible information about their country and
the media controls in place.
Each year, we conduct a survey among Chinese readers of the
bulletin. I would like to conclude with a quotation from one of those
readers as a testament to the importance of international support for
free expression and access to information in China and other countries
in the region.
``I am a lower class worker in Chinese society and I don't
speak English. An independent Chinese media like you, that does
in-depth reports about the situation in China, gives me a
better understanding of China's current situation and future
development. And it also helped my personal life and work. On a
macro scale, China is the largest authoritarian country in the
world, the Chinese Communist Party oppresses its citizens,
blocks information flows, and also threatens the existing world
order. I think the flow of information and freedom of speech
are very important to China's future development. Birds in
cages long to fly, even if we can't fly out now, hearing the
chirping of birds outside can still give us hope and faith!''
appendix
Table of Freedom in the World 2022 and Freedom on the Net 2021 ratings,
status, and 1-year trajectories for countries and territories (marked
with an *) in Asia
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Senator Markey. Thank you, Ms. Cook, very much. Thanks to
each of our witnesses.
Now we are going to move to the question period and let me
begin by, first of all, congratulating you, Ms. Ressa, and you,
Ms. Siu, for your courage.
We talk a lot in this body about standing up to repression.
That has been your lives. That is what you have been doing, and
we very much are in awe of the lives you have lived and the
fights that you have been willing to engage in to protect
freedom in not just your homelands, but across the whole
planet. So we thank you for that.
We begin, Ms. Ressa, with the numbers. These numbers are
staggering. We have heard the statistics about the 22
journalists and 63 lawyers killed since President Duterte took
office in 2016.
Each of these numbers represents people who you have known,
people who you have worked with, and you have lived in this
atmosphere of intimidation that you have resisted to the extent
to which you won the Nobel Peace Prize last year.
Can you talk about the personal impact all of these murders
have had on you and your colleagues in trying to bring the
truth to the Philippine people?
Ms. Ressa. First of all, thank you, again. Thank you so
much for listening. I think that is the first, that we are not
alone.
That is also something that the Nobel Committee helped
bring not just to journalists in the Philippines, but to
journalists all around the world because this kind of sustained
attacks that we have gone through globally in the last decade
is unprecedented. It is actually now 66 lawyers killed since
last year--I mean, since under the Duterte administration,
instead of 63.
Senator Markey, Senator Romney, sometimes we have hit new
lows in terms of expectations and new normals in terms of
violence.
In 2016, I just remember every night being shocked that
there would be another body dumped on the sidewalk, the face
masked in tape and it got to a point where by the end of 2016,
moving into 2017, the Amnesty International report that came
out that year where there was an average of 33 people killed
every night, every day.
Our one team was--we only had one team that would go out
overnight and they would come back with at least eight dead
bodies.
That was when I began to realize something has
fundamentally changed, and then when that became a new normal
and by 2017 the numbers changed in plain sight, the Philippine
police changed the almost 7,000 people killed to--back to 2,000
in plain sight, and they just changed it and atomized it. So
these numbers sometimes do not hold any meaning.
I just feel, for me, it is--I am at the tail end of my
career and I feel like this moment is extremely important. It
is the reason why Rappler was set up. So what we did is we
worked with our communities and we would not have been able to
do this without our communities, both financially and spirit
wise.
I think that is part of the reason the solution really has
to be with communities, how do we bring democratic norms back
to a more robust place. It has to be with the will of the
people, and what we have learned from our communities is that
they want us to hold the line and they are prepared now to do
that with us.
Senator Markey. Great. Thank you.
Senator Gardner and I, back 3 years ago, we were able to
pass the Asia Reassurance Initiative Act, which actually
resulted in an appropriation of $210 million a year for 5 years
from 2019 through 2023, to encourage democratic institutions,
to encourage human rights, transparency, accountability in the
private and public sectors all across Asia.
We are right now in the process of negotiating an extension
of that on the committee. It was about a billion dollars that
we were able to put in back 5 years ago, and it is a way of
thinking of Asia where we are in the game. The United States is
helping to support those very important institutions.
Where, in your opinion, Ms. Ressa, would the United States
be making the best investments with those hundreds of millions
of dollars over the next 5 years, perhaps, to support
independent media, to support other institutions that you think
are vital to ensuring that independent voices advocating for
freedom are heard?
Ms. Ressa. Thank you for asking, Senator Markey.
The independent fund for--IFPM, the International Fund for
Public Media, was set up precisely to try to get the 0.3
percent of ODA assistance up to at least 1 percent and to get
some of that for independent media.
Part of the problem that we have is that the business model
of journalism has collapsed. Advertising is, essentially, dead,
and the platforms that have been used to attack the credibility
of traditional news groups, news groups that stand by, that
have processes editorially, that stick to the facts, these news
groups now are under attack, and no place knows this better
than the Global South--than Asia.
So that is part of our goal. I do believe--I see this now--
independent media needs help to survive this time period. Hand-
in-hand with that as well is putting guardrails on technology
because it is impossible for us to do our jobs if we cannot
even get the news distributed to our consumers.
Other things are institutions. The institutions in
Southeast Asia, for example, that have--in the Philippines
within 6 months of the new administration--of the Duterte
administration--we watched many institutions fold. Some very,
very strong executives--how do we revitalize that?
Senator Markey. Can you talk a little bit about Facebook in
the Philippines?
Ms. Ressa. Yes, sir.
Up until January this year, the Philippines--for 6 years in
a row Filipinos spent the most time online and on social media
globally. This is from Hootsuite and We Are Social, that
statistic.
For many, many years, even during the time of Yahoo, any
new digital product was first tested in the Philippines,
products that are meant for the West. In 2018, when I
interviewed the Cambridge Analytica whistleblower, Christopher
Wylie, he called the Philippines the ``petri dish'' because he
said this is where Cambridge Analytica and its parent partner,
SCL, tested these tactics of mass manipulation, and if they
worked in the Philippines then they would--the word he used was
``port'' these tactics over to you.
So we were the guinea pigs. You were the targets. Social
media is, I think, an extension of how our institutions are
weaker and so what wound up happening is it has to be someone
you know to get things done.
Before we were the social media capital of the world, we
were the texting--the SMS capital of the world. It helped in
protests that were organized against President Arroyo in--when
she had taken office, right. Texting capital of the world.
This social networking can be a boon and can be a curse,
and for a period of time it was a blessing. This is why I
started Rappler on Facebook.
At a certain point, by 2015, when Instant Articles was
introduced, the same algorithms of amplification were not
changed and news went into this--its system where you cannot--
the system actually does not distinguish between fact and
fiction and it literally rewards lies laced with anger and hate
over facts.
So that is our biggest problem right now as journalists.
Senator Markey. Thank you.
Senator Romney.
Senator Romney. Thank you so much. I appreciate the chance
to hear from you and your testimony is quite moving and
disturbing. I will not be able to stay with you long. I came
late and I have to leave early. I do want to ask you a couple
of questions.
First, I will ask Ms. Siu, could you give me a sense of to
what extent do the people of Hong Kong understand what is
happening among them, what is happening in Hong Kong? Do they
have access to truth or has that been cut off for them in the
same way it has been cut off in the rest of China?
Ms. Siu. Thank you, Senator Romney, for your questions.
So as I have mentioned in my testimony, the National
Security Law was passed by the Chinese Government and it came
into effect in Hong Kong on July 1, 2020, and that really
changed the lives of Hong Kong people and that really imposed
very, very tight restrictions in terms of our access to
internet information and that imposed a very tight restriction
in regards to our freedom of expression.
So under the National Security Law, any permanent Hong Kong
resident or actually any foreign persons who are considered to
have committed crimes under the names of subversion, secession,
terrorism, and collusional foreign forces could face up to a
lifetime imprisonment in Hong Kong.
Since the implementation of the National Security Law, we
have saw that over 150 people in Hong Kong have been arrested
and that includes not just pro-democracy activists or high-
profile politicians, but then, really, journalists, media
persons, as well as academics and also students or speech
therapists who have been participating in our pro-democracy
movement. This implementation----
Senator Romney. Do the people of Hong Kong, do they still
have access to information and to truth or is it really--by
virtue of these changes you have described--has it really been
shut off? Do they no longer have access to information?
Ms. Siu. Our access is very limited right now. So since the
implementation of the National Security Law, we have saw that
almost all of our independent pro-democracy media outlets in
Hong Kong, including Apple Daily, Stand News, have been
forcibly shut down, and as I have mentioned that fearing the
date-back charges, all these media when they are shutting down
they have to erase their online presence.
They have to delete their previous articles and reportings
that they have made or else they will be--they will still be
put at the risk of being charged under the National Security
Law.
Aside from that, we are also finding that the access to
internet and also online information is going to be very
limited in Hong Kong.
So since May 2021, we have found that several pro-democracy
websites are being blocked in Hong Kong and last month our
organization's website was also being blocked in Hong Kong.
On top of that, we have received a letter from the Hong
Kong police department asking us to remove our content
regarding our campaigns on free political prisoners and asking
for international sanctions against Chinese and also Hong Kong
officials to be removed. So that really illustrates the
picture.
Senator Romney. Thank you.
Ms. Ressa, thank you for your participation and your
courage, and I am interested in the same question, which is to
what extent do the people of the Philippines understand what is
going on?
Are they angry at the repression of the media they are
seeing? Do they have access to truth or are they blindly going
along with what is happening and not paying much attention to
it?
Ms. Ressa. Thank you, Senator Romney.
I think in the beginning, in 2016, what we saw was a
gradual polarization of our society and it was a very simple
thing because we spend so much time on Facebook, right? What
happened was that one algorithm--how you grow your network,
friends of friends--that algorithm essentially meant that in
2016, while we all agreed on the facts, if you were pro-Duterte
you moved further right, and then if you are anti-Duterte,
friend to friend, meant you moved further left 2017, 2018,
2019, 2020.
So this is where we are. Our society has been polarized,
and in the beginning in 2016 up until, I would say, this year,
fear played a factor, the kind of exponential where free speech
was being used to stifle free speech, attacking exponentially
somebody who would criticize the drug war, for example. Those
were the first citizens attacked on social media.
They became--people were afraid and they became silent, and
then we went through 6 years. Now we are right before
elections, 40 days before elections, and it is extremely
chaotic in the Philippines. People are finding their voices. I
think this is why it is leading to an existential moment.
Do people know what is happening? Yes. The battle for
democracy can be won in our country and I have not stopped
speaking. We have not--our communities have moved forward.
Again, until we can have--until we can actually reach
people, until the lies--the virus of lies--this is what I
started calling it before the pandemic began--if this virus of
lies infects real people and it is much harder to cure real
people than it is to actually stop the infection.
Senator Romney. Thank you very much.
Finally, Ms. Cook, I am interested in your perception on
how effective we can be in getting truth to some of these
people in these nations.
When I hear Radio Free Europe, I think, do people still
listen to the radio anymore? Do we have better techniques? Your
suggestion--your first suggestion, which is that in our
discussions with other nations that in addition to the human
rights on our agenda we should talk about communication rights
and information rights as a vital human right.
I wonder, do we need to change the way we are communicating
with the world and change the way we are trying to get truth to
the people of the world where there is repression of their
vehicles of expression?
Ms. Cook. I think in a lot of ways Radio Free Asia and
Radio Free Europe are no longer just on the radio and I think
you do see some really critical ways, especially using
circumvention tool technologies and other avenues, to get
information to people inside China.
Even in places like China there are actually a lot of
people with illegal satellite dishes that will listen to
dissident satellite TV stations, will try to access BBC in
Chinese.
I think we do see situations where people are able to
access uncensored news. It is just very hard, and so I think
they need more and more. There is just many more barriers.
You do see that supply still does--sorry, demand, I think,
outstrips supply and so especially in terms of on the
technological side trying to find ways to help people in places
where information is blocked get access to that.
Honestly, there is also all kinds of other avenues of
supporting, for example, Hong Kong media to preserve and revive
the content that they have had to delete in Hong Kong in some
of the states. Can they revive it outside so people can access
it?
Because in Hong Kong, for example, there is not a full
grade firewall just yet. We are starting to see inklings of it,
but it is not to the level of mainland China. So I think that
is so vitally important.
I think we just should not underestimate the demand for
information in different countries as well as the creativity
that people have--civil society groups, digital activists, even
traditional media--and using a variety of platforms to reach
users.
On the other hand, we should not underestimate how creative
the Chinese Communist Party state media can be as well because
they are becoming more effective at using global social media
platforms as well to manipulate those.
So it is definitely a two-sided battle there.
Senator Romney [presiding]. Thank you much.
Senator Markey and I both have to go vote and so we are
going to take a recess for a moment. As soon as he gets back--
and he has already gone--he will come back and I will run off
and vote now. He will be back and continue the conversation.
So you all can take a break for a moment here and we will
resume in just a moment. Thank you.
[Recess.]
Senator Markey [presiding]. We will come to order. We
apologize. A roll call went off while we are in the middle of
the hearing, which required Senator Romney and I to go over to
cast our vote.
Let me continue. Ms. Ressa, voting is a vital way to hold
government accountable. As you know, I have personally been
banned from the Philippines for speaking out in support of
those who have shone a light on the Duterte government abuses,
like you and Senator De Lima, who is still unjustly detained.
As you mentioned in your testimony, the Philippines has
elections for president and vice president in May. What are the
prospects for a return by the new Philippines Government to a
respect for human rights and freedom of expression post
election?
Ms. Ressa. Senator Markey, you know firsthand the cost of
free speech. So it is hard to respond to that question because
it is unclear exactly what kind of president the front runner
would be. Ferdinand Marcos, Jr., he is the front runner in
statistical surveys.
What is also unclear is whether that will translate to real
votes. What we do know so far is that he has refused to do any
of the debates that are--with traditional news organizations.
We have seen the growth of SMNI, which is a group that is
connected with Pastor Quiboloy, the one that just got a
franchise I referenced, and Leni Robredo, the second--the woman
who is--it is almost like we are back in 1986. We have a Marcos
against a widow.
Vice President Leni Robredo comes up as the--is right
behind, but very far behind in the statistical survey. So
Filipinos, I believe, are hoping for a return to that. We are
at a point where the millions of--tens of millions who have
lost their jobs, the COVID responses that have not gotten
vaccines to every Filipino. We are talking about a 60 percent
plus vaccination rate in the Philippines. So there is still a
lot of work to be done.
Literally, we do not know what will happen next. I think
what I am trying to say is that I still have significant hope
that we will be able to go back to a robust democratic system
if the right steps are taken now.
Senator Markey. Ms. Ressa, you have spoken about the
Duterte government's use of lawfare to target you and other
journalists in the Philippines. Around the region, are you
seeing an increase in government's attempts to use the legal
system to stifle free speech and the media?
Ms. Ressa. Yes, absolutely. You are seeing the number of
people arrested. Myanmar, for example, we are watching very
closely with great alarm, and I think part of the reason we use
the phrase ``hold the line'' is that you do not want to step
off the line because the minute you do states come in and take
your freedoms away.
Senator Markey, if I could just add something on the role
of disinformation in all of this. This lays the groundwork for
lawfare. Senator Romney earlier asked do people know what is
happening.
They do, to a degree, but the way they interpret what is
happening is dependent on the disinformation or the lack of
it--the echo chambers. It is not a robust democracy in the
sense that you do not have--you cannot have the public debate
that is necessary for a democracy because we have been so
polarized.
So I go back to how can we do it. I think we are still at a
point where we can restore that public sphere, but it requires
your help. Thank you.
Senator Markey. Okay. Thank you.
Ms. Cook, in your 2021 report published by the National
Endowment for Democracy you found that Taiwan had reduced its
vulnerability to PRC state-linked disinformation campaigns
during Taiwan's January 2020 general elections.
How was Taiwan able to successfully counter PRC
disinformation efforts? Learning from Taiwan's example, what
can the United States do to help counter disinformation from
China throughout the remainder of Asia?
Ms. Cook. It is really so encouraging and incredible to see
what came together in Taiwan and it was very much a multi-
sector and multi-stakeholder effort.
So you had the government, on the one hand, trying to put
out certain information, but absolutely civil society and also
the technology sector as well.
So you have had increased monitoring and some really
sophisticated use of detection and machine learning by civil
society groups to identify these kind of telltale signs of
particular narratives, differences in character, other ties
back to China, content farms in Malaysia as well, and then even
working with technology companies, not only American ones, but
for example, Line, which is widely used, and creating a feature
where people could actually enter into their conversations a
little fact checking bot, so kind of using bots for good, that
would tie to a fact-checking civil society group.
So I think it was very much a multi-layered effort and very
strategic in terms of really getting into those avenues in the
information nodes where the disinformation was spreading.
It was also media literacy, and I think what was really
important is that it has been media literacy not only targeted
at children, because we see that in a lot of countries in terms
of through the educational system and that is obviously very
important, but also to the older generation, so trying to find
ways of reaching member--more older members of society who are
maybe not as digitally literate and giving them a better
awareness of disinformation and how these things work.
So I think that was a lot of it, and there is a lot that
others in Asia can learn from Taiwan.
Senator Markey. Thank you. I appreciate it.
Ms. Siu, Taiwan--can you talk about that for a second and
what should the United States be doing in order to ensure that
there is full and fair dissemination of information in Taiwan,
given what the PRC might attempt to do?
Ms. Siu. Thank you, Senator Markey, for the question.
So I think from seeing how the PRC Government has
transformed Hong Kong as the international financial center
with a rather independent judiciary system and also the basic
protections of freedom and also rights with our people's access
to free information and internet, I think we have witnessed how
capable the PRC Government is into turning a rather democratic
place, a democratic city or region, into a country or a region
controlled completely by the PRC.
I think it is a very important lesson to be learned from
the experience of Hong Kong that the United States and other
democratic governments have to take steps right now and to take
concrete steps into protecting the freedom of expression in
countries like Taiwan and Japan and then to provide assistance,
to extend our support, to the media agencies in these relevant
countries and regions to also cover--to provide and ensure a
continuous and timely coverage of incidents and developments in
oppressed regions like Hong Kong, Tibet, and East Turkestan.
Senator Markey. Thank you and, again, thank you for your
great answers.
Thank you to each and every one of you for your tremendous
work in this area. This subcommittee is going to continue to
work to shine a spotlight, but using your lives, using your
work, in order to accomplish that goal so that repression, the
compromise of freedom, of free speech, of the press wherever it
may exist will receive the attention of this subcommittee. So
we thank you for that.
If there are no more questions, I will close today's
hearing, and to our witnesses, thank you for your testimony.
To the members of the committee, the record will stay open
and you will have until the close of business on Friday, April
1, to revise and extend your remarks and submit questions for
the record to our witnesses, and we would ask our witnesses to
respond to those questions in a timely fashion.
So this hearing of the Asia Subcommittee is now completed
and with that, we stand in adjournment.
[Whereupon, at 3:14 p.m., the hearing was adjourned.]