Freedom of expression

In a region as vast as Asia, with a technology as multidimensional as the internet, and with rights which are universal and indivisible, what can be said about the intersection between these? With more than 50% of the global population living in Asia, is it possible to identify commonalities that resonate across the region? These are some of the questions that representatives from more than 50 ...

From 4-6 October 2017, FORUM-Asia, APC, Bytes for All, Pakistan and Global Partners Digital are organising a regional consultation in Bangkok on the State of Freedoms of Assembly, Association, Expression and Religion on the Internet in Asia.

This report looks at freedom of expression and religion practices online in Bangladesh, India, Malaysia and Pakistan. Why freedom of expression and religion online and not hate speech online?

APC is concerned at news that access to and use of the internet is being restricted in Catalonia, as part of a trend to curtail freedom of expression in the context of the call for a referendum to decide the future status of the region.

A coalition of some 35 civil society organisations has written to several international bodies including the African Union and the United Nations Human Rights Council over the recent internet shutdown in Togo.

The articles in this bilingual edition point to how visibility, a complicated phenomenon in itself, is the starting point of a different way of being, and how the stories we tell – entangled in the fine wires of technology – are necessary and essential, and could be the foundations for the movement for change.

In late May the Guardian released the Facebook Files, leaked internal documents revealing how the company moderates content. Although Facebook has made some improvements, these documents confirm that it's often one step forward, one step back, as the platform continues to censor women's agency, especially women of colour and especially in relation to activism, while letting harassment flou...

This paper was developed by APC in response to the call for submissions on the role of national human rights institutions in Southeast Asia in protecting human rights by the Asia Centre. It addresses the ways ICTs and the internet create new spaces where NHRIs can improve the way they function.