LIRNEasia » Hamadoun Toure

Toure supports Gyanendra’s Law

Rohan Samarajiva — Mon, 21 Feb 2011 17:22:02 +0000

The Secretary General of the International Telecommunication Union is elected every four years by governments who have paid their dues to the Union (or have had it paid on their behalf). This does not make him a natural advocate of anything revolutionary. Yet, this is what he says:

There is no alternative, suggests the secretary general. “Once people have tasted the goodies of education and communication you can’t cut it off. If you cut it off you’re gone, and that’s what happened in Egypt,” says Touré. “This is a very good reason for us to encourage the rolling out of broadband infrastructure so people can have better access everywhere in the world. The citizen will be able to take care of their own destiny — if they are given this powerful weapon, a telephone, a smartphone.”
It requires some heads of state, though, to be more adult: some still surely want to clamp down on communications?

Think twice

“Yes, we have not to underestimate people. They are mature enough to take care of their own destiny. That’s what we saw in Tunisia and Egypt. I hope that anyone who is ready to cut off citizens from ICT will think twice from now on.”

Guess the odds are not good for Qaddafi (Gaddafi)?

Africa: Fastest Growing Market For Mobile Phones??

Chanuka Wattegama — Tue, 13 May 2008 08:10:53 +0000

Africa is the world’s fastest growing market for mobile phones over the last three years with 65 million new subscribers in 2007 alone, according to the head of the International Telecommunication Union (ITU).

Hamadoun Touré, ITU Secretary-General, said the figure is cited in the United Nations agency’s regional report entitled “African Telecommunication/ICT Indicators 2008: At a Crossroads,” which he presented at the opening of the ITU Telecom Africa trade fair here on Monday.

A UN press release quoted Toure as saying, “Today, the African ICT industry is an exciting place to be. Market liberalization continues and most countries have established regulatory bodies to ensure a fair, competitive and enabling environment.”

The report indicated that there were more than 250 million mobile subscribers on the continent at the start of 2008.

Internet access as basic human right and Burma’s undersea cable

Rohan Samarajiva — Mon, 08 Oct 2007 07:56:11 +0000

Looks like international law is being made as we speak. According to the UN, basic human rights are violated when countries cut off Internet access. Burma is not the first. King Gyanendra of Nepal cut off everything in his palace coup. If cutting off Internet is a violation of human rights, what is cutting off phone service to entire regions like Jaffna? More people use the phone than the Internet.

The story about the undersea cable is quite intriguing. To the best of my knowledge, SEA-ME-WE 3 is the cable the government official is referring to (they were not part of the SEA-ME-WE 4 consortium). I have not checked this fact, but my recollection is that Burma had been disconnected from SEA-ME-WE 3 for non-payment some time ago. The cable was not ripped out and physically disconnected, but it was not operational.

It is of course possible that the debts were paid and the country reconnected in the past few months. However, given the Myanmar government’s bald-faced lies about the occupants of the cyber city, I would not rule out another violation of the fourth precept of Buddhism.

:: Daily Mirror – FINANCIAL TIMES ::

UN telecommunications agency chief Hamadoun Toure said Friday in Geneva that no government had the right to cut their citizens off from the Internet, following recent incidents in Myanmar.Toure, who heads the International Telecommunications Union (ITU), underlined that UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon had recently described safe access to the Internet as a basic human right.

The Internet blockage has severely reduced the flow of video, photos and first-hand reports of the violence there that had helped galvanise an outcry against the ruling generals.

The cut was widely blamed on security forces there. A telecom official in Myanmar had confirmed that the nation’s main link to the Internet was down, but blamed the problem on a damaged undersea cable.