Jailed Chinese Journalist Wins Golden Pen Award
This is probably not going to make Yahoo!'s public relations department very happy.
The World Association of Newspapers, while meeting in Cape Town, South Africa, awarded the prestigious Golden Pen of Freedom Award to jailed Chinese journalist Shi Tao. The newspaper association gave the award on June 4 -- the 18th anniversary of the Chinese government's crackdown on democratic protesters in Tiananmen Square.
Recently, we wrote about how the Chinese government used information supplied by Yahoo! to track down Shi as the author of an e-mail to overseas pro-democracy Web sites. Yahoo! officials have defended their actions, saying the company was complying with local laws when it handed over the information about Shi's e-mail account.
However, Shi's supporters see the company's decision as collaboration with a repressive government. The award's presenter said in his speech that giant Internet companies have a special responsibility: "They have an obligation to ensure that the basic human rights of their users will be protected, and they must carefully guard against becoming accomplices in repression."
Tao's mother, Gao Qinsheng, accepted the award on his behalf. Rebecca MacKinnon of RConversation, who was in Cape Town for the conference, said Goa told her that Yahoo! has not tried to help get Tao freed from his 10-year prison sentence.
2:28 PM ET | 06- 6-2007 | permalink
