Google Makes Wall Great Again

Google blocks China adverts for sites that help bypass censorship 
Visitors and locals rely on virtual private networks to access global internet 
By Yuan Yang in Hong Kong

Google has stopped distributing advertisements in China for two websites that review anti-censorship software, in a move that signals the US tech giant’s efforts to curry favour with Beijing.
Last week, VPNMentor, a company that reviews virtual private network services that allow users to bypass China’s internet controls and avoid surveillance, said that Google had refused to sell its adverts to Chinese users, after doing so for more than two years. 
 On Wednesday, Top10VPN, another review site, said it had received the same notice after advertising with Google for several months.
 VPNMentor posted a screenshot of an email to Twitter, appearing to be from Google, saying “it is currently Google policy to disallowed [sic] promoting VPN services in China, due to the local legal restrictions”.
 Foreign businesses and visitors to China, as well as local citizens, rely on VPNs to access the global internet, including platforms such as Google and Facebook, which are blocked by China’s “Great Firewall” of internet controls.
Google runs adverts on third-party websites in China.
 Google said it had “longstanding policies prohibiting ads in our network for private servers, in countries where such servers are illegal”, adding that bans on VPN adverts in China had been in place for several years.
 On Friday, China’s market regulator demanded that internet platforms step up their censorship of adverts.
 However, there is no blanket ban on selling VPNs in China.
Chinese regulators issued a notice in 2017 stating that VPN providers would need to be licensed in order to operate in China.
Regulators told the Financial Times last year that the situation was “complex” and that they were still “researching” how to apply the measures.
 Charlie Smith of GreatFire, a censorship monitoring organisation, criticised Google’s blunt action in relation to VPNMentor and Top10VPN as being too broad.
He said: “There are legally registered VPNs operating in China, so either Google has not kept up to date with local regulations or they are overstepping their boundaries.” 
 David Kaye, the UN special rapporteur on the promotion and protection of the right to freedom of opinion and expression, said that Google’s move “deprived [Chinese users] of the choice to find uncensored material”. 
 “If Google is in the business of expanding access to information, why do they not conceive of their business in those terms in China?” he asked.
 Mr Kaye also questioned whether Google had researched the legal status of the review sites, or “sought ways to ameliorate the impact on expression” before deciding to enforce a ban against them as regards all VPN-related adverts.
 Mark Natkin of Marbridge Consulting, a tech research group in Beijing, said that Google “may be trying to comply with the spirit of the regulation”.
 “Google’s situation is that, based on their past decisions in China, they have a more delicate relationship with the Chinese authorities and feel compelled to make additional efforts to curry favour and get back in the good graces to get approval to re-enter the market,” he added.
Lee Jyh-An, associate professor of law at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, agreed, saying the move was a “signal to show kindness towards the Chinese government”. 
 “Google have withdrawn from China before and that scene wasn’t pleasant, so if they want to come back again, they have to show a stronger ‘kindness’ signal.”
 Google closed its China search engine in 2010 after suffering cyber attacks and periodic blocks from the government.
The company announced that it was no longer willing to censor search results, devastating its relationship with Beijing at the time.
 Google said its decision to block VPNMentor’s adverts was “completely unrelated” to trying to re-enter China.
 “As we’ve said for many months, we have no plans to launch Search in China and there is no work being undertaken on such a project,” the company added, referring to its previously leaked “Dragonfly” plan to bring a censored Google Search back to China.

China's Final Solution

U.N. Rights Officials Criticize China Over Muslim Internments

By Nick Cumming-Bruce

Uighur Muslims demonstrated in Brussels in September against China’s mass detention of Uighurs in the western colony of East Turkestan.

GENEVA — United Nations human rights officials have sharply condemned regulations issued by China that seek to provide a legal basis for the mass internment of Muslims in the East Turkestan colony.
Six United Nations officials and rights experts said in a letter sent on Monday to the Chinese government that the regulations were a violation of international law, and they urged that those responsible be held accountable.
The regulations were issued by the authorities in East Turkestan in western China, who said they were intended “to contain and eradicate” extremism.
The United Nations experts contended that the new rules to justify mass internments in “re-education centers’’ were based on overly broad definitions of extremist behavior and amounted to criminalizing the legitimate exercise of basic rights.
The experts said the regulations were “incompatible with China’s obligations under international human rights law.”
Western reporting and academic research in recent months have exposed a crackdown on East Turkestan’s Uighur population and other minorities in which as many as one million people, about one-tenth of the region’s population, have disappeared into concentration camps. 

In addition, nearly all aspects of daily life and religious practice have become minutely regulated.
Among those who participated in preparing the letter were Elina Steinerte and Bernard Duhaime, who are members of United Nations panels monitoring enforced disappearances and arbitrary detentions; David Kaye, the special rapporteur on freedom of expression; and Fernand Varennes, an expert on minority rights.
An example of what they viewed as overreach by the Chinese officials was references in the regulations that identified extremism as the “spreading of religious fanaticism through irregular beards” or the selection of names.
The regulations stated the authorities’ intention to make religion “more Chinese and under law and actively guide religions to become compatible with socialist society.’’

“We would like to highlight that the homogenization of society and the aim to make religion ‘more Chinese’ are not considered legitimate aims under international law,” the experts said. 

They also argued that the coercive nature of the re-education centers meant they amounted to detention camps.
The statement appeared likely to hit a raw nerve in Beijing with its forceful critique of a policy closely associated with Xi Jinping’s drive to stabilize East Turkestan, a region that has increasing strategic significance in China’s ambitious Belt and Road initiative to connect the country with Central Asia and Europe.
In August, Chinese officials denied to a United Nations panel that it was engaged in mass internments. 

Since then, China has begun a campaign through the state media defending its policies as a "humane" initiative, saying that it was providing "vocational" training for East Turkestan’s ethnic minorities, protecting vulnerable populations from the scourge of extremism and generating employment opportunities.
The human rights experts said they were concerned that the East Turkestan regulations and other measures to suppress dissent applied across China not only violated basic rights, but by “creating pockets of fear, resentment and alienation” could lead to more radicalization and extremism.
The other rights experts who participated in drafting the letter were Ahmed Shaheed, who monitors freedom of religion and belief, and Fionnuala Ní Aoláin, who follows the protection of human rights in the context of counterterrorism measures.
Their critique came only a week after China defended its record at the United Nations Human Rights Council in Geneva, claiming “tangible and enormous progress” in promoting and protecting “human rights with Chinese characteristics” and dismissing criticism as politically motivated.