On Dec. 6, the United States Senate voted to approve
legislation extending permanent normal trade relations to Russia. Coming on the heels of the House vote
last month, this action marked the final chapter in a Congressional debate over
Russia and how to find a balance between trade promotion and human rights. Internet censorship is an issue with
implications for both, and a digital trade provision in the PNTR legislation
could be a first step towards utilizing trade enforcement to combat it.
Though Russia had acceded to the World Trade Organization
(WTO) in August, the U.S. would not be able to take full advantage until it
removed application of the Jackson-Vanik amendment and granted PNTR to Russia. The Jackson-Vanik amendment was first
enacted in 1974 to prohibit normal trade relations with the USSR and other
Communist bloc countries that violated human rights, specifically by
restricting the emigration of dissidents.
It was one of the first attempts to legislatively link the issues of
human rights and trade and, in debating its repeal, Congress had to again
confront the problem of how to balance those issues in today’s world.
There was broad consensus in favor of PNTR for Russia from a
trade standpoint, as it would mean that U.S. companies could compete for access
to the Russian market on a level playing field with other WTO member
countries. And Jackson-Vanik’s
targeting of dissident emigration was now an obsolete issue. Yet to its credit, Congress was
unwilling to myopically consider only the trade context, but harkened back to the
human rights legacy of Jackson-Vanik to combine the bill with the Sergei
Magnitsky Rule of Law Accountability Act, addressing human rights violations
and corruption in present-day Russia.
This was done despite loud complaints and opposition from the Russian
government.
The Russian government certainly did not help its cause
during the time Congress was debating Jackson-Vanik, with enactment of policies
that showed its regression on human rights, such as blacklisting websites that
could be shut down by the government.
The issue of Internet censorship is one that CCIA has long characterized
as uniquely straddling the divide between trade and human rights. In addition to the fact that Internet
freedom is indispensable to freedom of expression in the 21st
century, filtering and blocking the flow of information online can have real
trade consequences in discriminating against foreign-based services and
content. Before the
Congressional-Executive Commission on China in November 2011,
CCIA President & CEO Ed Black analogized the potential effectiveness of addressing
Internet censorship in a trade context to going after Al Capone for tax
evasion.
It is highly appropriate that legislation seeking to address both trade
and human rights in Russia should include a provision requiring the United States Trade Representative to report annually on
Russian discrimination against U.S. digital trade. With enactment of this provision, Congress has recognized
the importance of enforcement against new digital barriers to trade. We hope that such trade enforcement
will also prove effective in combating the Russian government’s efforts at
censoring the Internet and denying its citizens their freedom of information
and expression.
