Open letter to a Chinese speakers' bureau

Please keep away for safety

Thank you for your invitation! But in the publicity surrounding the arrest of the Canadians I read that criticising the Chinese government is against the same Chinese law as espionage. As an expert in AI ethics, I cannot go without commenting on Chinese AI policy, and not all of my comments are positive. I would of course never engage in espionage, but I do not want to be subject to the death penalty for doing my job of critiquing government and holding power to account. So I am afraid that I cannot foresee coming to speak in China again (I have before twice, in 2013 and 2018 [pictured]) until this law and policy have convincingly changed, and both domestic and foreign critics of the government are safe to state their opinions.

I hope your agency is doing everything in its power to secure the release of all political prisoners in China who were arrested only for speaking as academic experts.


With sincere hope and best wishes for our shared future, yours faithfully,

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