11/21/2005

singapore on watch list of reporters sans frontieres

15 countries were declared as enemies of internet freedom of expression by the reporters sans frontieres (rsf,reporters without borders). these are countries who are deemed to have cracked down hardest on internet freedom, censoring, monitoring, harassing, intimidating and even imprisoning internet users and bloggers. the countries are belarus, myanmar, china cuba, iran libya, nepal, north korea, saudi arabia, syria, tunisia, turkmenistan, uzbekistan and vietnam. gosh, aren't we lucky not to be included despite our low ranking in press freedom. but we are not totally out of danger so to speak. we are in their watchlist. the watchlist are for countries deemed to be bothering freedom of expression on the internet. but we are in good companies. hey, the usa, the european union, malaysia and thailand are also in the same category as us. not bad huh? this group being watched includes bahrain, egypt, kazakhstan, south korea and zimbabwe, plus those mentioned above. to be in the company of such great luminaries for press freedom like the usa and the european union means that we are doing ok. we are within the acceptable norms of civilised western societies. george bush and tony blair will speak for us as their equals. it is indeed a nice feeling.

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