Tonga attends Second World Internet Conference in Wuzhen, China

Tonga’s Deputy Prime Minister, Siaosi Sovaleni said it is important to ensure that challenges faced in small island developing states such as Tonga are raised.

“Solutions discussed should take into account these challenges. Three key issues that will be discussed in the Conference are innovation, governance and cyber security”.

Sovaleni made the comments as he led a government delegation to the Second World Internet Conference in Wuzhen, Zhejiang China.

At the opening of the conference, Chinese President Xi Jinping called for Internet access to be expanded worldwide and for more international cooperation to manage content and ensure legality online.

"Cyberspace is not a domain beyond the rule of law. While respecting Internet users' rights of exchanging ideas and expressing their minds, efforts should be made to build a sound cyberspace order under the law so as to protect the legitimate rights and interests of all Internet users," the president said.

"Greater efforts should be made to strengthen ethical standards and promote civilized behavior in cyberspace," he added.

Sovaleni agreed with President Xi that cyberspace should not become a battlefield for countries to wrestle with one another and it should not become a hotbed of crime. The international community need to work together to prevent and oppose the use of cyberspace for criminal activities.

Currently there about 3 billion Internet users of which nearly 700 million are from China.

Over 2000 delegates from 120 countries attended the three-day conference.

The summit hopes to enable a platform to develop a globally shared view of how the Internet is reshaping our economic, social, cultural and human environments.

Tonga’s Ambassador to the PCRC, Tau’aika ‘Uta’atu welcomed the high level participation from Tonga and stated that this will strengthen Tonga’s relationship with China and the countries that participated.

Source: Pacific Loop