[Community-Discuss] Associated Press article

[Arnaud AMELINA]

Hi Ronald,
Recent discussions(*) enlighten  somehow  the contexts in which Cloud
Innovation allocations were made.
Let not narrow down  things and not create unnecessary tension.

Unless evidence exists to prove collisions or conflict of interest, I see
nothing wrong with CEO having meeting with people.
Lu probably met all AFRINICs CEOs, but also met other people including even
those who disagree with him as well as with Cloud Innovation and Larus
activities

While 1st allocation is important, subsequent allocations require
justifications, but also proof of usage (80-90 %) of previous allocations
according to justifications and in compliance with policies and RSA..

The process initiated by AFRINIC and the ongoing cases will also show
deficiencies and complicities if they do exist…

--
Arnaud

(*)

https://lists.afrinic.net/pipermail/community-discuss/2021-August/004628.html

https://lists.afrinic.net/pipermail/community-discuss/2021-August/004692.html

Le ven. 1 oct. 2021 à 21:24, Ronald F. Guilmette <rfg at tristatelogic.com> a
écrit :

> https://twitter.com/fbajak/status/1443927102793920515?s=21
>
> As you can see, the Associated Press has just published something relating
> to the ongoing saga of AFRINIC, its trials and tribulations.
>
> I have a few brief comments on this.
>
> Firstly, I find it really rather interesting that Adiel Akplogan met
> (privately?) with Lu Hung, apparently at the ICANN meeting in Beijing,
> 7-11 April, 2013, just shortly before Lu Heng received his first big
> allocation of IP space.
>
> This, combined with the fact that the then current AFRINIC CEO, Adiel
> Akplogan, was at the time operating his own private company in Canada,
> whose actual business endeavors have never been very well explained,
> is, at the very least, suggestive that more questions should be asked
> about Lu Heng's original justification(s) for the large amount of IPv4
> space he got.
>
> I have asked here to see those original Cloud Innovation justification
> documents and that request has been met only with stony silence in reply.
>
> One thing is clear however, from both AP's reporting and from my own
> research -- Lu Heng has repeatedly claimed that he was awarded his
> various large IPv4 block initially based on his purported need to
> support vast numbers of VPN end users in China.  From the AP article:
>
>     Emails obtained by the AP show that in his initial request for IP
>     addresses in 2013, Lu made clear to AFRINIC that his customers would
>     be in China. In those emails, Lu said he needed the addresses for
>     virtual private networks -- known as VPNs -- to circumvent the Chinese
>     government's firewall that blocks popular websites like Facebook and
>     YouTube there.
>
>     He said he discussed this with Adiel Akplogan, AFRINIC's first CEO,
>     in Beijing in a 2013 meeting cited in the emails.
>
> These facts are absolutely astonishing and I urge everyone to take special
> note of them.  The five Regional Internet Registries are generally assumed
> to be mostly or entirely apolitical bodies, but here we have a documented
> case in which one of the five, AFRINIC, is alleged to have deliberately
> and with clear intent facilitated the large scale circumvention of one
> country's local Internet regulations.  And not just any country, but
> China, the newest superpower in what is now our tri-polar world.
>
> If I were some high official of the Chinese Communist Party, I would at
> this moment be dashing off an angry and pointed diplomatic communiqué
> demanding an explanation, and an apology, from AFRINIC leadership.  It
> is one thing to be "just a bookkeeper", as Lu Hung insists the RIRs
> should be, and quite another to be an active and knowing participant in
> a deliberate scheme to undermine and circumvent some country's national
> Internet regulation efforts.  The fact that this was done, allegedly, for
> the good cause of anti-censorship does not change the fact that AFRINIC
> apparently involved itself in a bit of surreptitious and clandestine
> international intrigue whose clear and stated goal was to engineer a
> large scale end-run around China's Great Firewall.
>
> As an American, I am rabidly supportive of the free flow of information,
> including into and out of China.  But I am not persuaded that AFRINIC, as
> an international Internet administrative body, should ever have involved
> itself in such a politically fraught back-room scheme.  The fact that it
> appears to have done so is not likely to enhance its image on the world
> stage, nor that of any of the other RIRs, whose international reputations
> may also be damaged by these revelations.
>
> That having been said, I do suspect that Chinese Communist Party was not
> and is not totally unaware of what Lu Heng has been up to from 2013
> onwards.
> Why haven't they arrested him for his gross attempts to circumvent the
> Party's singular control of the Chinese Internet?  I could speculate, but
> I prefer to just leave the question open, and let everyone with an interest
> in these matters reach their own conclusions, as I have.
>
>
> Regards,
> rfg
>
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