[CCWG-ACCT] Human Rights

Nigel Roberts nigel at channelisles.net
Fri Mar 4 08:30:54 UTC 2016


I don't  know where you get that idea.

However, given ICANN's General Counsel's office penchant for literal 
construction (I have read many of their submissions in the various IRPs 
and Court cases) there are two serious legal issues which need dealing 
with in order to ENANCE (and not REMOVE) accountability of the 
Organisation in human rights matters.

That is the dualist nature of the legal system where ICANN is 
incorporated (both the US and the UK are dualist), and the lack of any 
applicable law whatsoever in the US that applies to non-state-actors.

The junior senator for Alberta clearly is concerned with the concept of 
applicable Chinese law, judging by yesterday's letter to Steve.

On 03/03/16 20:12, Martin Boyle wrote:
> Nigel, you seem to be advocating US interpretation of human rights,
> which in turn would imply a degree of extraterritoriality.
>
> That should not be the case for ccTLDs as Eberhard points out, but it
> might be a big issue for geo-TLDs, too.
>
> I think that "applicable law" is the best formulation for where we are
> and WS2 can have the joy of interpreting what are the implications of
> that.  Let's leave such a difficult discussion to then.
> en
> Martin
>
>
>
>
> Martin Boyle
>
> Senior Policy Advisor
>
>
> Sent from my iPhone
>
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> On 2 Mar 2016, at 13:58, Dr Eberhard W Lisse <el at lisse.na
> <mailto:el at lisse.na>> wrote:
>
>> And,
>>
>> it does so for gTLDs only.
>>
>> el
>>
>> On 2016-03-02 15:42 , Nigel Roberts wrote:
>>> As you rightly say, I am foreshadowing WS2.
>>>
>>> But I am also renewing my strong objection to the "applicable law"
>>> formulation, for the following reason.
>>>
>>> It's quite valid to comment, in response, that ICANN *already* regulates
>>> the takedown of domain names in the protection of third-party rights -
>>> the protection of intellectual property.
>>>
>>> That is all well and good, and is a worthy step in the protection of
>>> that person/organisations rights under (for example) Art. 1, Prot.1 of
>>> the ECHR -- provided it is balanced against the rights to free
>>> expression and due process.
>>>
>>> But it's not hard to see that the "applicable law" scenarion could be
>>> misused to impose controls on content.
>>>
>>> For example, the right to privacy and the right to free expression
>>> intersect in different places in different countries.
>>>
>>> This is the well-known "margin of appreciation" in Human Rights
>>> jurisprudence.
>>>
>>> So, ICANN, by binding itself to 'applicable law' would potentially bind
>>> itself to breaching the First Amendment, by having a by-law obligation
>>> to 'applicable law' in say the UK (libel), France (celebrity) or China
>>> (respect for authority).
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> On 02/03/16 13:20, León Felipe Sánchez Ambía wrote:
>>>> Hi Nigel,
>>>>
>>>> This will be an interesting discussion on our WS2 work plan.
>>>>
>>>> I fail to see why or how ICANN would be obliged to develop such
>>>> policies as ICANN is not an entity with (legal) powers to take down
>>>> any kind of content. The only situation in which I see ICANN taking
>>>> down a site, as opposed to a particular content within a website, is
>>>> in case a Court ordered such take down which, in my mind at least,
>>>> would be subject to different applicable norms in the context of
>>>> international cooperation I think, and for that Court order to be
>>>> escalated to ICANN level I would think it would need to be taken
>>>> through the path of registrant-registrar-registry before even getting
>>>> to ICANN but that is just an assumption, of course.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Best regards,
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> León
>>>>
>>>>> El 29/02/2016, a las 8:26 p.m., Nigel Roberts
>>>>> <nigel at channelisles.net <mailto:nigel at channelisles.net>> escribió:
>>>>>
>>>>> http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-china-35685999
>>>>>
>>>>> This tells me that the right to free expression is one which ICANN
>>>>> should respect, and not merely 'as required by applicable law'.
>>>>>
>>>>> It seems to me that 'applicable law' here would have ICANN institute
>>>>> policies allowing for takedown of the material that is contained in
>>>>> the books referred to in this article, would it not?
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