Um país dois sistemas

The role of the US Internet firm Yahoo in helping Chinese security officials to finger a journalist sentenced to 10 years for e-mailing state secrets is filtering into mainland China. (...)

Yet if netizen reaction in China is resignation, the story of Yahoo's complicity in the arrest of Shi Tao, (...)

So far, Yahoo has refused to offer details beyond this statement released Thursday: "Yahoo must ensure that its local country sites must operate within the (local) laws, regulations, and customs."

When queried whether Yahoo gave Shi's address to police after a court request, or whether police simply phoned Yahoo offices on the mainland to get help, Hong Kong Yahoo marketing spokesperson Pauline Wong said she was "unable to give out any information like that."

"For Yahoo to say it only must abide by 'customs,' well, (...)" says Nicolas Becquelin of Human Rights In China. "Anything can be called a custom." (...)

Shi was arrested in November, and convicted in April (...). He had e-mailed personal notes from a staff meeting about overseas Chinese returning for the 15th anniversary of the Tiananmen massacre. (...)

In the past year, Google, Microsoft, and Yahoo have been in competition to attract China's 95 million Internet users. They have been pressured to comply with local laws (...)

In China, "netizens" is the term for a class of mostly educated, urban Chinese who regularly use cyberspace for a range of activity and expression that exists in a grey area. (...) Both netizens and chat-room users typically use anonymous e-mail addresses.

Chinese netizens received their first shock two years ago when authorities tracked down one of the most famous anonymous cyber-essayists, Liu Di, who wrote under the name "Stainless-steel mouse." Ms. Liu, a college student, wrote satirically about the fact that while most Chinese no longer believe the doctrines of communist ideology, they must all act as if they do. (...) She was then held for more than a year, without charges, before being released. The case triggered an Internet campaign to have her released, and for authorities to relax their policies. (...)