Hi all, Regarding to the recent Hong Kong Extradition Bill, Wikimedia Taiwan has issued the following statement, please have a read.
*** Wikimedia Taiwan requests the attention of Wikimedia Foundation and global communities of Wikimedia movement to the Hong Kong Extradition Bill related issues and to draft out related policy accordingly. To our knowledge, the Government of Hong Kong Special Administrative Region recently has made a legal amendment about extradition to Taiwan, China, Macau, etc. Nevertheless, the draft of the amendment creates distrust from local residents and international stakeholders. After the major scale of protest, Hong Kong SAR Government announced the bill will be suspended for the moment. Wikimedia Taiwan has no comment regarding the internal affairs of Hong Kong. However, Hong Kong is a common transit location for the Wikimedia community members from Taiwan to attend international events. In 2015, the staffs of an independent bookstore in Causeway Bay, Hong Kong, were disappeared. That incident and the intent of the current amendment cause us as a Wikimedia chapter is worrying about the safety risk while traveling abroad. Therefore, we have three requests: 1. To Wikimedia Foundation’s legal and safety department, please stay tuned regarding this incident, and co-op with Hong Kong User Group and Wikimedia Taiwan to provide possible support on legal and strategic issues in order to ease the risk concern for the Wikimedia volunteers who contribute in the region. 2. Even though the legal concern is relieved temporarily, we still would like to ask for any Wikimedia organizations hosting an international event while making the travel arrangements to avoid arranging the Taiwanese participants to travel by airlines owned by China or Hong Kong, nor making the transit at Hong Kong or any other airports within China. 3. The ongoing discussion about Wikimedia movement strategy should include evaluation about the possible influence of illiberal democratic regime’s threat to free knowledge. These regimes may bring damage such as legal intimidation, violent threat, and monopoly of ideology. From the recent experience of Chinese Wikipedia, we cannot anticipate openness and inclusion could passively defend from these kinds of sabotage. Instead, it needs a more powerful strategy and action to respond on. - This statement is open for all Wikimedia volunteers from Taiwan to cosign as individual or communities in the following link: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_Taiwan/Declaration/The_statement_of_Wikimedia_Taiwan_regarding_the_Extradition_bill_of_Hong_Kong This statement is also announced on our Facebook fan page: https://www.facebook.com/wikimedia.tw/photos/a.593864927316487/2171318986237732/ On behave of Wikimedia Taiwan -- Regards, Ted Chien Member of Supervisory Board, Wikimedia Taiwan -- Think Different, Do Smarter, Work for Joy! -- About Me: http://about.me/htchien _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines and https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia-l New messages to: [email protected] Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, <mailto:[email protected]?subject=unsubscribe>
