The US-based organizers of an international human rights conference said they canceled it days before it was to open because China pressured the African host country to exclude Taiwanese activists. Organizers of Access Now, a New York-based advocacy group, said late Friday it had canceled the RightsCon summit in Zambia that was due to take place next week after the Zambian government initially said it was postponed. Access Now said it had been informed by Zambian officials that the government had been pressured by China over the conference "because Taiwanese civil society participants were planning to join us in person." Access Now said it pushed back on any move to exclude delegates from Taiwan, the AP reports.
"We believe foreign interference is the reason RightsCon 2026 won't proceed in Zambia," Access Now said in a statement. The government wanted the conference to "moderate specific topics and exclude communities at risk, including our Taiwanese participants, from in-person and online participation," the statement added. The Zambian government earlier announced it was postponing the conference because it wanted information on the themes and topics of discussion to ensure they aligned with the country's "national values, policy priorities and broader public interest considerations." Zambia has strong political and economic ties with China, largely through Chinese mining interests in the southern African nation.
Taiwanese Minister of Digital Affairs Lin Yi-jing said in a statement on Facebook on Saturday that the cancellation showed China's unease over "the ideas of freedom, democracy and rule of law that Taiwan and RightsCon represent." The annual event focuses on human rights and technology and deals with issues like internet censorship, electronic surveillance, and cyberwarfare. More than 2,600 participants were to attend in Zambia, with another 1,100 attending online, Access Now said. They represented more than 150 countries. Last year's summit was held in Taiwan.
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