Hi Andreas

China was in fact the only country to oppose the Wikimedia chapters' request for observer status. Other countries for political or unknown reasons may have aligned with China's position on process, but no country besides China unilaterally or independently opposed the Wikimedia chapters' request. 

Relatedly, you may have seen that the Wikimedia Foundation just obtained accreditation at the UN's Economic and Social Affairs Council where a similar situation was unblocked by a vote of the member countries:

https://wikimediafoundation.org/news/2022/07/22/wikimedia-foundation-earns-accreditation-to-the-united-nations-economic-and-social-affairs-council-ecosoc/

Best,

Jan

==

Jan Gerlach

Public Policy Director

Wikimedia Foundation

1 Montgomery Street, Suite 1600

San Francisco, CA 94104

jgerlach@wikimedia.org

Andreas Kolbe <jayen466@gmail.com> schrieb am Fr., 22. Juli 2022, 19:44:

Dear all, 

A week ago, the WMF issued a press release, "Seven Wikimedia chapters rejected as permanent observers to the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO)":

https://wikimediafoundation.org/news/2022/07/15/seven-wikimedia-chapters-rejected-as-permanent-observers-to-wipo/

This stated, in part, "China was the only country to oppose the Wikimedia chapters’ request for observer status, again, claiming that chapters were complicit in spreading disinformation and are subsidiaries of the Wikimedia Foundation. These statements are unfounded and misrepresent Wikipedia’s model which prioritizes accuracy, neutrality, as well as the fact that the chapters are completely autonomous."

About a week ago, I had seen and retweeted a Twitter thread[1] by James Love[2], the Director of Knowledge Ecology International, listing a whole litany of countries that had supported China's position.

I checked the webcast of the July 15 WIPO proceedings today,[3] and there were over a dozen countries – Russia, Belarus, Pakistan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Iran, Syria, Algeria, Zimbabwe, Nicaragua, Cuba, Bolivia, Venezuela, North Korea – that took the floor to support and endorse China's position – more, in fact, than took the floor to support the chapters' approval.

Would it be possible to amend the press release accordingly?

Best,

Andreas

[1] https://twitter.com/jamie_love/status/1550520525180518400

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Love_(NGO_director)

[3] Available here: https://webcast.wipo.int/ (afternoon session of July 15, part 6. Admission of Observers)

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