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Re: Legality of IETF meetings in PRC. Was: Re: Request for community guidance on issue concerning a future meeting of the IETF

2009-10-08 19:11:58
At 04:07 AM 10/7/2009, Henk Uijterwaal wrote:

(Personal opinion)

On Mon, 5 Oct 2009, Margaret Wasserman wrote:

While I do think that the IAOC should be aware of the potential legal 
implications of where we hold our meetings, I wonder if we are treating 
China unfairly in this discussion...

I agree.  So-far, we have always assumed that discussions on crypto
as well as writing, testing and using code during the meeting were
legal in the country.  And if they weren't, we'd assume that the
local policy would not notice.  China is not different in this respect.

 Let's parse your statement a bit closer.

Actually, so far all of our discussions etc have been legal in the countries in 
which we've met - or at least we've never been told they are unlawful. Or do 
you have a specific list of countries in which such discussions or development 
were prohibited by law or contract?    

Unlike you I, and I expect many (most) of us would never assume that "local 
policy would not notice".  If I were a fiduciary for the IETF I would expect to 
be sued for failure to exercise due diligence if I took this position and 
"someone noticed".

If I were told that a specific act or topic of discussion was illegal or could 
lead to civil or criminal penalties I would have to evaluate whether that 
specific act or topic were core for the purpose of the meeting or event.  I 
would  then have to make a decision to either refrain from the act or topic 
(difficult if it was core to the meeting), or (if responsible for the meeting) 
move the meeting somewhere else.  I would not assume I could blithely ignore 
local law.  Hopefully, TPTB are doing this.

For the PRC we've been told (in black and white as part of a legal document - 
not as anecdotal information) that  a) certain acts and topics of discussion 
are forbidden by law or contract, b) that the penalties for (any of us 
collectively) breaking the law or terms of the contract could result in meeting 
termination in addition to any individual penalties.  To my knowledge, this is 
unique to our experience. I haven't seen any comments to the contrary in this 
discussion thread

In the PRC, the certain prohibited acts and topics are acts and topics that 
have not - to my knowledge - been prohibited either by contract or law at any 
other venue to which we've been.  The acts may be and some of the topics are 
certainly core to every IETF meeting we've held prior  to this and probably 
prior to every meeting we will hold before any possible future PRC meeting.

So no, we're not treating China unfairly in this discussion.  We're not holding 
China to a higher standard, we're questioning - as we must for due diligence - 
whether the standard to which they want to hold the IETF is too high or too 
disjoint from the normal set of standards and practices for IETF meetings.

Mike







Perhaps this is something that we could expect our host to help us determine?

The IAOC is in contact with the host about all the issues raised on
the list (and then some more).

Henk

-- 
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Henk Uijterwaal                           Email: henk.uijterwaal(at)ripe.net
RIPE Network Coordination Centre          http://www.xs4all.nl/~henku
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1001 EB Amsterdam      1016 AB Amsterdam  Fax: +31.20.5354445
The Netherlands        The Netherlands    Mobile: +31.6.55861746
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        hope for a solution, where everybody still lives happily.
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