Today a hearing on "Censorship & cyber-dissidents. Freedom on the internet in authoritarian states" took place in the European Parliament. Organisers Jules Maaten (VVD, Netherlands) and Henrik Lax (Svenska Folkpartiet, Finland) discussed with cyber-dissidents from China and Tunisia, Reporters Without Borders and the internet-provider XS4all the increasing grip of governments in repressive states on the content of the Internet.

Jules Maaten urges the European Commission to be more pro-active: "Free speech must remain the basis of the Internet. Europe should follow the American example where legislators are working on a Global Online Freedom Act. We urge the European Commission to follow this example and come up with a European version of this Act."

"Countries such as China and Cuba, Burma and Belarus are placing tighter restrictions on the use of the Internet to prevent freedom of expression. For example Yahoo and Google have, in China, given in to pressure to hand over information on their clients and stirred up a hornets’ nest. European firms face the same issues, examples being Telecom Italia in Cuba and Wanadoo – which belongs to France Telecom – in Tunisia. It is intolerable that Western businesses should be helping repressive governments to trample human rights underfoot."
 
Henrik Lax added: "I would also like to see an attempt made at working out a European code of conduct for European internet providers. We must make it perfectly clear what we stand for. The problem does not primarily lie with the Internet companies, but with the repressive regimes themselves. Trade and communication with such countries can have a beneficial influence, which we support, but we cannot allow these regimes to bully us as regards what we trade in or what we communicate."