On occasion of the opening of the computer fair CeBIT, the Society for Threatened Peoples (STP) has accused China, the official partner country, of violating Internet freedom – both at home as well as on a global scale. "Under Xi Jinping, the head of state and party leader, censorship was tightened considerably, and more and more bloggers are arbitrarily detained. Thus, the Communist Party is trying to demonstrate its claim to absolute power. In a new human rights report, which was published by the STP on Thursday, it is also said that China is launching a frontal attack on Internet freedom all over the world. The 77-page report provides information concerning the bloated censorship apparatus and the increasing restrictions on access and exchange on the Internet and via social media. In addition, the report contains 77 individual stories of imprisoned bloggers, online journalists and Internet writers.

"Worst of all is the persecution of Uyghur people who seek information or communicate via the Internet. If an Uyghur living in Xinjiang province uses social media on the Internet, he/she is already halfway in prison. No other region in China has similar restrictive regulations concerning the use of such media," said the STP's China-expert, Ulrich Delius. Anyone who purchases a SIM card for a mobile phone must be registered in a central police database. The new regulations and laws – as well as the large room for interpretation in the existing criminal laws such as Article 293 – are an open door for arbitrary criminalization of Internet users and provide the basis for a surveillance state.

The STP shows that there is no Internet freedom for the Uyghur people, as can be seen from the case of Ilham Tohti – a professor of economics who was sentenced life imprisonment – and his seven students who have to serve three to eight years in prison. It is not even possible to work against prejudice and against tensions between the population groups, as Tohti and his students had tried. There are also draconian punishments for Tibetans, Mongols and Han Chinese if they send photos to foreign countries or report human rights violations. In February 2015, the Tibetan Kalsang Tsering was thus sentenced to two and a half years in prison for allegedly passing on information to friends abroad. The journalist Gao Yu is on trial for allegedly passing on secret documents of the communist party to foreign online media.

However, China is not only violating the freedom of the internet freedom at home. There are also hacker attacks against foreign NGOs – and Beijing has started a campaign for a "Chinese Internet" and for the right of every state to control and censor the Internet in order to undermine the freedom of the net.

Attention editors

On occasion of the opening of the CeBIT, the STP will hold a demonstration (with hollowed-out computer screens and numerous banners) in front of the Hannover Congress Centrum on Sunday, March 15, starting at 3.30 pm. On the first day of the fair (March 16), the STP will gather for a human rights campaign for internet freedom in China – at 8.15 am at the North-Entrance (Europaplatz).

Our human rights report

You can download our human rights report "Xi Jinping's Great Digital Wall" (in German) here.