home
***
CD-ROM
|
disk
|
FTP
|
other
***
search
/
Internet Info 1994 March
/
Internet Info CD-ROM (Walnut Creek) (March 1994).iso
/
inet
/
isoc
/
isoc_news
/
issue1-3
/
n-1-3-040.92a
< prev
next >
Wrap
Text File
|
1993-03-01
|
3KB
|
59 lines
N-1-3-040.92, EARN Link to Yugoslavia Suspended - What are the
Issues?, by Frode Greisen, <Frode.Greisen@uni-c.dk>
Networkers usually feel as an international community without borders.
Sometimes they notice with interest and appreciation that they are
communicating with people from a new country that has not been on the
Internet before, but usually they think that the more transparently
information crosses the boundaries, the better.
Some of us have worked for years to connect more and more countries in
order to integrate the world-wide academic community. While we
obviously had our private and sometimes conflicting views on the
regimes of new countries, we generally saw increased communication as
a force supporting understanding and democratization, in addition to
its value for research and education.
It was therefore hard to accept one of the consequences of the
suspension of cultural, educational, and scientific cooperation with
the new Yugoslavia (Serbia and Montenegro) decided in UN resolution
757. What happened was that the Austrian government ordered Austrian
university employees to cancel the EARN link to Belgrade. After a
subsequent difficult discussion in the EARN board we decided there was
nothing we could do at present. This is because in most countries
EARN is paid by the government for the purpose of academic and
(public) research and with a ban on collaboration in these areas,
there would be no need for a link. For good and bad, EARN - and many
other components of the Internet - is not a general purpose
infrastructure like the phone and fax network.
Many arguments have been brought forward about this incident by
network users both in Yugoslavia and in other countries. Progressive
academics and students and peace activists in Belgrade complain to
have their e-mail connection cut. Perhaps even worse, researchers in
Skopje and other non-sanctioned parts of the former Yugoslavia have
had their communication with colleagues all over the world suspended.
So, in this case as in other cases, sanctions also hit the wrong
persons.
The most immediate hope which we probably all share is that the
terrible events causing the sanctions will stop very soon.
On the slightly longer term, EARN - and other Internet components -
should investigate the pros and cons of establishing the network as an
infrastructure which is robust to political intervention.
Even if the bill of rights in most countries mean that no-one can
forbid a citizen to communicate with citizens in any other country,
the bodies paying for parts of the network can still set policies for
the use of those parts. With the network becoming increasingly
intertwined and with transit over various geographical and
organizational areas being the rule rather than an exception, work is
needed to make those policies consistent.
*Chief Consultant, UNI-C