135 The Law on Protecting Human Rights: Mongolia’s Misnomered Media Censorship Law

Mongolia is a landlocked nation bordered by Russia and China. The country is comprised of a largely ethnically homogenous population, with around 80% of Mongolians belonging to the Kalkh Mongol ethnic group (Lattimore, 2023). Mongolia’s population is small compared to its landmass, with there being about 2 people for each square kilometer of land (United Nations, 2021). Despite this theoretically low population density, nearly 2 million of Mongolia’s 3.3 million citizens live in Ulaanbaatar, a highly-urbanized city whose population was around 70,000 people in 1950 (Lattimore, 2023; World Population Review, n.d.). In 1990, following a long history of power struggles involving China, Russia, and Japan, Mongolia’s fourth and current constitution was implemented, giving “top priority to national sovereignty and to human rights” and creating a government consisting of a prime minister, a president, and a parliament, which is known as the Mongolian Great Khural and is comprised of 76 members (Lattimore, 2023).

However, despite the democratic nature of Mongolia’s governmental structure and its constitution’s focus on protecting human rights, according to Reporters Without Borders’ 2022 World Press Freedom Index, in 2022, Mongolia was indexed at 90th place out of 180 countries ranked by press freedom (Reporters Without Borders, 2022). Its ranking in 2022 was significantly lower than the year prior: in 2021, it was ranked at 68th place. (Reporters Without Borders, 2022). In 2023, one motion by the government to increase official censoring abilities caught journalistic attention, casting light on one facet of the nation’s changing information landscape which exemplifies the reported deterioration of press freedom in Mongolia.

On January 27, 2023, news outlet Poynter published an article written by Seth Smalley titled “Mongolia Moves to Seize Power to Shut Down Internet, Control Social Media” (Smalley, 2023). In this article, Smalley explains that one week prior to the time of his writing, the Mongolian Parliament passed a bill titled “Law on Protecting Human Rights” no more than two days after it was introduced (Smalley, 2023). This law would introduce new powers to the government of Mongolia, including giving “the minister of internal affairs the right to decide when to shut down the internet” and allowing the government to create a “public relations unit with 13-15 members tasked with enforcing regulations on social media and reviewing content for violation” (Smalley, 2023). According to Smalley, the law also declares that users need “express government consent” to post information about government officials and that “any information shared in an online group of more than three will be subject to inspection” (Smalley, 2023).

Gemma B. Mendoza, journalist for Philippines news outlet Rappler, reports that the law’s definition of violating content includes “denigrating state symbols, national, historical and cultural values, culture and customs of Mongolia,” and “extremist activities, undermining national unity . . . [and] inciting and calling for crimes” (Mendoza, 2023a). Other violations on the list include “encouraging or advertising the use of narcotic drugs and psychoactive substances” and “discriminating against an individual or specific group based on ethnicity” (Mendoza, 2023a). At the time of Mendoza and Smalley’s reporting, the Mongolian Parliament had removed the text of the bill from their official website, leaving it only accessible through archival sites (Smalley 2023, Mendoza 2023a).

Smalley reported that even though the law had already been passed by the Parliament, President of Mongolia Ukhnaagiin Khürelsükh could still veto it by the February 1 implementation date (Smalley, 2023). Fortunately for the 6,000 individuals who signed a change.org petition created by local non-governmental organizations (NGOs) which decried the new law, on January 30, President Khürelsükh did veto the bill (Baatar, 2023a; Mendoza 2023b). State-owned news outlet Montsame reported on the veto, and while it did not mention censorship, it did state that the veto occurred due to the law’s failure to ensure “public participation and [reflect] the suggestion of persons or entities whose legal interests are affected by this law,” and thus was passed in violation of Mongolia’s Constitution (Ganchimeg, 2023).

Despite the law’s veto, supporters of free speech still have concerns over the Parliament’s recent actions, criticizing the illegality of the law’s passing and the government’s apparent attempts to use censorship to quell social unrest.

In early December of 2022, protests broke out in Mongolia in response to alleged corruption after the government announced a discrepancy in the amount of coal exported to China and the amount of coal received by China as imports. According to Reuters’ reporting on the incident, “at least 385,000 tons of coal [were] unaccounted for between 2013 and 2019,” and Erdenes Tavan Tologi JSC, a state-owned mining company, was deemed responsible (Davaasharav, 2022). The individuals behind the coal theft were alleged to be a part of “a well-connected ‘coal mafia’” whose members include elites and high-ranking government officials (The Economist Newspaper, 2023). Protesters demanded accountability for those who embezzled public funds and transparency on the results of relevant government investigations which, according to a former member of Parliament, had been occurring for the past 9 years (Davaasharav, 2022).

Protesters initially attempted to “storm the main government building adjacent to” Sukhbaatar Square, the square where they were convening, but afterwards, the protest became peaceful, marked by an “upbeat, almost studious atmosphere” under which debate and discussion thrived (The Economist Newspaper, 2023). While the Mongolian People’s Party (MPP) responded to the protests by arresting high-ranking executives and even investigating former president Khaltmaagiin Battulga, former minister Oyungerel Tsedevdamba indicated to the Economist that “it [would] take more than [that] to appease the protests,” as the underlying inequality which contributed to the protest would not be alleviated by such contained anti-corruption measures. (The Economist Newspaper, 2023).

Duuya Baatar, the cofounder of the Nest Center for Journalism Innovation and Development, an NGO which “operates Mongolia’s lone fact check group” and was allegedly unsuccessfully recruited to serve as a social media monitor and censor following the introduction of the Law on Protecting Human Rights, told Mendoza that the law is viewed by some Mongolians as a response to the December protest, as “many of those who joined the protests coordinated via social media” (Baatar, 2023a; Mendoza, 2023b). Baatar told Mendoza that “people on social media are expecting that [this introduction of legislation] could be because of scheduled protests in [the spring]” (Mendoza, 2023b). This complicates the Ministry of Digital Development and Communication’s claim that the law was passed to protect human rights, as the right to assemble and protest is a human right which the bill may be trying to limit (Mendoza, 2023a).

Beyond concerns of suppressing assembly and protest, some have spoken out against the illegal haste with which the law was passed by the Parliament. CEO and lawyer Narantsetseg Batsaikhan told Mendoza that “the process by which the law was passed violated Mongolia’s Law on Legislations,” as the law was not made open for public discussion before its introduction to Parliament (Mendoza, 2023b). While the Law on Legislations does allow for exceptions when security or safety are in danger, according to Batsaikhan, the law did not fall under those guidelines, and thus, was illegal (Mendoza, 2023b). Smalley corroborated her concern, stating that the law’s parliamentary deliberation “took place during work hours” and ultimately “passed without meaningful public scrutiny” (Smalley, 2023). Baatar, too, shared the two’s concerns, telling Smalley that “passing this law without properly introducing it to the public or stakeholders is a violation of numerous laws” (Smalley, 2023).

Furthermore, Batsaikhan widened the discussion on Mongolian media censorship beyond the Law on Protecting Human Rights, stating that the law is not the only censorship legislation worthy of concern in Mongolia (Mendoza, 2023b). She told Mendoza that “many of the provisions on supposed content violations” are reiterations of other legislative provisions, remarking that existing laws had already introduced a concentration of “broad powers on a single unit of state” via the “proposed ‘public relations unit’” (Mendoza, 2023b). She warns of subjective decisions on what is and is not a violation of content guidelines and a governmental unit simultaneously serving as the “police, prosecutor, and court” (Mendoza, 2023b).

Free speech is a necessary human right, especially in a country with alleged low human rights protection for some marginalized groups. To understand the importance of free speech, one can listen to the testimony of psuedonymed ‘Erdene,’ a queer woman who was interviewed by Global Voices reporter Amedeo Bastiano at age 19 (Bastiano, 2020). In the interview, Erdene stated that queerness is highly stigmatized in Mongolian society, and that although Mongolian law protects individuals from sexuality- and gender-based discrimination, official responses to anti-queer violence have been rare (Bastiano, 2023). After describing her and her peers’ personal experiences with stigmatization, fear, and violence, she stated that open speech is necessary for restoring a sense of peace, inclusion, and safety to Mongolian individuals who are part of the LGBTQ+ community (Bastiano, 2023). In her words: “I am open, because nobody [else] is. Because if nobody speaks out about the situation, nobody will know . . . and I want people to know (Bastiano, 2023).

If it were enacted, the Law on Protecting Human Rights would further narrow the ability for individuals to speak freely using telecommunications, causing a narrowing of access to the internet according to governmental whim and allowing for a subjective future implementation of censorship in the nation. Additionally, as the law only prevents discrimination on a basis of ethnicity, hypothetically, discriminatory beliefs against the LGBTQ+ community might be protected while the right for queer activists to convene might be stifled, if those plans of assembly were viewed to be contradictory to the MPP’s goals of protecting national security and punishing those who advocate against traditional Mongolian cultural traditions (and, according to Erdene, queerness is certainly not included in Mongolian cultural attitudes) (Bastiano, 2023). When considering this perspective on the importance of free speech in Mongolia, readers may agree that any potential limitations to free speech and assembly might have dire consequences for marginalized groups in the nation.

On March 18, 2023, Duuya Baatar updated her website Mongolia Media Watch with a new update on the law. According to her reporting, in late February, the law was rediscussed by the Parliament following the presidential veto (Baatar, 2023b). Prior to the discussion, organizations including Reporters without Borders called for the Parliament to uphold the presidential veto, and finally, the law was annulled, with about 90% of Parliament members voting against the law they had voted to pass in January (Baatar, 2023b; Reporters Without Borders, 2023). Baatar states that “the Parliament ordered the Government and National Human Rights Committee to work on the proposed regulation again by following the due process and to submit a law that aims to ‘actually protect human rights on social media'” (Baatar, 2023b). While this event marks the finale of the Law on Protecting Human Rights, Baatar makes special note that, like Montsame’s article on the presidential veto, the Parliament did not mention the free speech limitations mobilized by the law (Baatar, 2023b). Additionally, given Batsaikhan’s claims that parts of the law which promote censorship are reiterated in already-extant laws, human rights defenders should continue to monitor the freedom of Mongolia’s media landscape. (Mendoza, 2023b).

Still, the annulment of the Law on Protecting Human Rights marks a victory for free speech advocates in Mongolia, denying “political authorities the ability to make arbitrary and politically motivated decisions . . . to censor any online content they dislike” (Reporters Without Borders, 2023). Onlookers interested in anti-censorship advocacy can take note of and seek inspiration from the measures which helped prevent such legislation passing, acknowledging the importance of reporters like Duuya Baatar in informing audiences on proposed advances in telecommunication censorship.

References:

Baatar, D. (2023, January 26). Over six thousand Mongolians Petition for veto on New Social Media Law. Mongolia Media Watch. Retrieved April 2, 2023, from https://duuyaatnest.substack.com/p/over-six-thousand-mongolians-petition?sd=pf

Baatar, D. (2023, March 18). Social Media Law of Mongolia annulled in defense of free speech. Mongolia Media Watch. Retrieved April 2, 2023, from https://duuyaatnest.substack.com/p/social-media-law-of-mongolia-annulled

Bastiano, A. (2020, August 21). For LGBTQ+ people in Mongolia, stigma is a fact of life. Global Voices. Retrieved March 26, 2023, from https://globalvoices.org/2020/08/21/for-lgbtq-people-in-mongolia-stigma-is-a-fact-of-life/

Ganchimeg, B. (2023, January 1). President invokes veto on law on protecting human rights on social media. Montsame News Agency. Retrieved April 2, 2023, from https://montsame.mn/en/read/312102

Lattimore, O. , Harris, . Chauncy D. and Sanders, . Alan J.K. (2023, March 14). Mongolia. Encyclopedia Britannica. https://www.britannica.com/place/Mongolia

Davaasharav, M. (2022, December 8). Mongolians brave bitter cold to protest ‘coal theft’ corruption. Reuters. Retrieved April 23, 2023, from https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/mongolians-brave-bitter-cold-protest-coal-theft-corruption-2022-12-08/#:~:text=ULAANBAATAR%2C%20Dec%208%20(Reuters),of%20so%2Dcalled%20coal%20theft.

Reporters Without Borders. (2022). Mongolia. 2022 World Press Freedom Index. Retrieved April 2, 2023, from https://rsf.org/en/index

Reporters Without Borders. (2023, March 15). Mongolia: RSF urges legislators not to override presidential veto of Dangerous Social Media bill.

Reporters Without Borders. Retrieved April 2, 2023, from https://rsf.org/en/mongolia-rsf-urges-legislators-not-override-presidential-veto-dangerous-social-media-bill

Smalley, S. (2023, January 27). Mongolia moves to seize power to shut down internet, Control Social Media. Poynter. Retrieved April 2, 2023, from https://www.poynter.org/fact-checking/2023/mongolia-law-protecting-human-rights-shut-down-internet/

The Economist Newspaper. (2023, December 15). Mongolians brave the cold to decry corruption. The Economist. Retrieved April 2, 2023, from https://www.economist.com/asia/2022/12/15/mongolians-brave-the-cold-to-decry-corruption

United Nations. (2021). Mongolia. UNData. Retrieved April 2, 2023, from http://data.un.org/en/iso/mn.html

World Population Review. (2023). Ulaanbaatar Population 2023. World Population Review. Retrieved April 2, 2023, from https://worldpopulationreview.com/world-cities/ulaanbaatar-population