COALITION FOR HUMAN RIGHTS IN ASIA

May 6, 2009

An Open Letter to the 111th Congress

This letter is sent on the stationery of the Coalition for Human Rights in Asia, a group of Asian-American organizations dedicated to advancing freedom and human rights in home countries now suffering under repressive dictatorships. It is also signed by Americans whose home countries have become places of comparable repression and suffering, and by other American leaders committed to the advancement of world Internet freedom.

In writing, we are moved by two strongly held beliefs that lead us to urge prompt action in the face of what we believe to be a historic opportunity for the United States and the peaceful advance of freedom.

Our Beliefs

We believe that America’s values and interests can be powerful catalysts for peacefully opening and transforming closed society regimes. The successes of such initiatives as the Anti-Apartheid Movement and the Campaign for Soviet Jewry are but two notable examples of the power of American human rights initiatives to alter history.

We believe that the walls used by 21st Century tyrannies to isolate and control their citizens are increasingly electronic rather than physical barriers. We thus share the view, expressed by Congress when it passed the FY 2008 Appropriations bill, that “ensuring the freedom of Internet communication in dictatorships and autocracies throughout the world is a high and critical national interest priority of the United States.” We believe that the historic effects of Berlin Wall’s collapse and the impact of mere fax machines on the former Soviet Union can be replicated in many dictatorships if America commits itself to eliminating today’s Internet firewalls.

Action by the Congress Can Peacefully Change the World

We write because of our shared view that American interests and values will be powerfully advanced by a priority U.S. commitment to defeat the efforts of closed society regimes to isolate and control their people by monitoring and censoring Internet use.

We further write because we believe that such a historic goal is now as achievable as it is imperative – and believe that with modest support the following historic outcomes can be realized:

An at-will ability of the President of the United States to interactively communicate with any group in the world of his choosing – with safety and anonymity for the persons listening and responding to him;

An at-will and safe access to Western websites by all residents of closed societies;

Secure and interactive communication between the Dalai Lama and his Tibetan followers, interactive worship services conducted by the Pope or Evangelical leaders for millions of Chinese House Church Christians, and similarly secure communication with residents of such closed societies as Iran, Burma, Cuba, Vietnam, Syria and Laos; and

Safe communication to and between residents of closed societies when their regimes initiate political crackdowns or seek to cover up internal scandals.

We Note the Following, Critical Facts:

The technology to achieve this capability exits and can be implemented today for a cost that is insignificant relative to the promise of advancing American interests or securing freedom for so many, so peacefully.

Protocols developed by the volunteer-based, otherwise unsupported Global Internet Freedom Consortium [“GIF”] have long allowed large numbers of users in the world’s dictatorships to enjoy the same safe and unmonitored access to the Internet as enjoyed by U.S. citizens;

The popularity of the GIF protocols has overloaded their servers -- thus requiring the recent restriction of their “lifeline” services to peak usage levels of 600-700 million hits and more than one million unique viewers per day;

The protocols’ design makes them inappropriate for terrorist communications;

The protocols are uniquely scalable;

Support of $30 million, mostly for the purchase of information technology equipment, will allow the GIF protocols to accommodate peak usage levels in the world’s dictatorships of at least 15 billion hits and more than 50 million unique viewers per day -- levels that will achieve 10% “tipping point” Internet freedom penetration in every dictatorship but China, and will bring China close to a significant 5% penetration level;

Support of $50 million, again largely for the purchase of information technology equipment, will allow the GIF protocols to accommodate peak usage levels in the world’s dictatorships of at least 45 billion hits and more than 100 million unique viewers per day – levels that will effectively shatter the Internet walls of the world’s dictatorships;

A Call For Action

We respectfully call on Congress to seize this historic opportunity by providing the funds that will make it possible for broadly used and field tested Internet Freedom protocols to achieve peak use levels in the world’s dictatorships of at least 50 million unique viewers per day. We further express the hope that Congress will appropriate funds sufficient to accommodate 100 million unique viewers in the world’s dictatorships per day.

We look forward to further meetings with such champions of the cause of Internet freedom as Speaker Pelosi, Senators Specter, Leahy and McConnell and Congressman Wolf -- and with other Member of Congress -- for the purpose of advancing the goals to which we are implacably committed.

Respectfully submitted,

Ammar Abdulhamid,
Executive Director and Founder
Tharwa Project (Syria)
http://foundation.tharwa.ws/

Ali Afshari
Akbar Atri
Ahmad Batebi
Mariam Memarsadeghi
Kianoosh Sanjari
Iranian Human Rights Activists

Marah Bukai
President and Founder
Al Waref Insitute (Syria)
www.alwaref.org

James Cason,
President
Center for a Free Cuba
cubacenter.org
Former Chief of U.S. Interests Section, Cuba

Tsering Dorjee
General Secretary
Dohokham Chushi Gangdruk (Tibet)
Chushigandruk.org

Angel De Fana
Director,
Plantados until Freedom and Democracy in Cuba.

Bob Fu
President
China Aid
chinaaid.org

Pema Chhinjor Khangtetsang
Tibetan Activist
Director Steering Committee
Alliance for Reform and Democracy in Asia
Asiademocracy.org

Sam Kim
Executive Director
Korean-American Church Coalition for
North Korean Human Rights
LetMyPeopleGo.org

Aung Kyaw Oo
Director
Free Burma Federation
Democracyforburma.worldpress.com

Huber Matos
Cuba Independiente y Democratica

Omer Memet
World Uyghur Congress General Assembly
uyghurcongress.org/

Binh Nguyen, M.D.
President
Committee to Support the Non-Violent Movement for
Human Rights in Vietnam
Rallyingfordemocracy.org

Richard Saisomorn, Ph.D.
AmeriLao President
Laotian New Generation Democracy Movement
Amerilao.org

Alim Seytoff
General Secretary Uyghur American Association
uyghuramerican.org

http://www.amerilao.org/forum_thread_849_Specter-Brownback-Secure-$30-million-for-Internet-Freedom.html