To: <culture@wsis-cs.org>

>From: "Myriam Horngren" <mh@wacc.org.uk>
>To: <crisinfo@comunica.org>, <OURMEDIA-L@lists.ou.edu>,
><alt.wsis@lists.riseup.net>,"Comm Rights-Asia" <commrights-asia@fma.ph>,
><CRISusa@comunica.org>
>Subject: [CRIS Info] UNESCO Convention on Cultural Diversity: CRIS Statement
>
>The campaign for Communication Rights in the Information Society (CRIS:
> www.crisinfo.org ) welcomes UNESCO's near-unanimous approval of the
>Convention on the Protection and Promotion of Cultural Contents and
>Artistic Expressions. The Convention is a clear demonstration that
>governments recognize that culture cannot be reduced to a mere commodity.
>By endorsing the Convention, governments have shown that they are prepared
>to take positive steps to support cultural diversity in the age of global
>cultural industries.
>
>However, while we support and encourage the ratification of the treaty, we
>have the following concerns:
>
>* We would have liked to see stronger emphasis on the protection and
>promotion of cultural diversity within countries, especially indigenous
>cultures. We denounce the hypocrisy of those countries that suppress and
>destroy indigenous cultures internally while claiming to support cultural
>diversity beyond their borders. The CRIS Campaign will remain vigilant,
>and will condemn and mobilize against any attempt by any state to try and
>use this Convention to marginalise women, or to repress ethnic minorities,
>migrants, sexual minorities, or indigenous peoples;
>
>* We applaud the elimination of language from earlier drafts of the
>Convention that would have supported and strengthened the current
>extremist copyright regime. However, the remaining unbalanced language on
>copyright in the Convention's preamble is a clear step backward from the
>2001 UNESCO Universal Declaration on Cultural Diversity;
>
>* We are deeply concerned by the failure to stress the importance of the
>public domain, fair use and creative commons;
>
>* We deplore the fact that there is no mention of the need to end the
>theft of indigenous culture and traditional knowledge by the transnational
>copyright and patent industries;
>
>* We will remain vigilant with regards to the Convention's relationship to
>other treaties, which as it stands is extremely ambiguous and therefore
>may encourage some trade ministers to ignore the Convention altogether in
>their negotiations.
>
>With these concerns in mind, we call on:
>
>* Governments to ratify the Convention;
>
>* Civil society to closely monitor their national trade ministers first as
>they head to Hong Kong for the WTO negotiations and in all future
>bilateral or multilateral trade negotiations;
>
>* Civil society, to mobilize and use the UNESCO Convention a means to
>transform domestic cultural, media, and communications policy in order to
>bring about cultural justice.
>
>Contacts: act@crisinfo.org
>More information: www.mediatrademonitor.org ; www.crisinfo.org
Nearby Wed Oct 26 13:37:15 2005