China, Europe seek human rights protection amid rise of technology

(ECNS) -- 2022 China-Europe Seminar on Human Rights, themed on Science and Technology and Human Rights, was held in central China’s Wuhan and Vienna, Austria on Tuesday.

Over 100 human rights experts from China, Austria, the UK, Germany, Hungary, Italy, Greece, Spain and other countries participated in the seminar online and offline, seeking solutions on how to protect human rights amid the technology era.

European and Chinese human rights experts conducted in-depth exchanges at the seminar to promote mutual understanding and cooperation.

Heinz Fischer, former president of Austria, and president of Austria-Chinese Friendship Association, pointed out that, the Internet, big data and artificial intelligence (AI) are changing human life, which are also posing challenges to the protection of human rights.

Andreas Riecken, Austrian Ambassador to China, said that although AI and emerging technologies have great potential to promote human rights protection, they may also pose a serious threat to human rights; China is currently playing a pioneering role in science and technology development, and Austria attaches great importance to conducting exchanges and cooperation with China in the field ofscience and technology and human rights

Christina Binder, professor of European law, international law and comparative law at Bundeswehr University Munich and University of Vienna, highlighted that emerging technologies are of great significance, which helps protect the human right to health, the right to life, the right to education and even the right to vote. But it also brings huge challenges to the protection of the right to privacy and right to family life. Emerging technologies can only serve the protection of human rights if they comply with international human rights law, the professor added.

Todd Howland, chief of the Development, Economic and Social Issues branch of UN Human Rights, said that in the face of the "triple crises" of environmental pollution, climate change and biodiversity degradation, technology is a key tool to promote human economic and social development; Technology innovation helps promote people's well-being, but current its global distribution is uneven. To this end, it is necessary to combine scientific and technological innovation with the right to development to ensure a fair distribution of scientific and technological innovation and contribute to global sustainable development.