It’s about time: Yahoo! new chief executive Carol Bartz says that human rights trump doing business. Bartz’s remarks on May 5 opened a Yahoo! Business & Human Rights Summit at which she acknowledged that the US Internet pioneer made some mistakes in foreign markets. “It is really going to take all of us working together to learn better how to act as good world citizens,” Bartz said. “We don’t want to impinge on anybody’s rights. We don’t want to force our beliefs versus someone else’s beliefs but we do have a responsibility.” “It isn’t our Number One obligation,” she maintained. “Our Number One obligation is to be good world citizens.” Carol Bartz replaced Jerry Yang last January. Two years ago, Jerry Yang – as well as other Internet executives – were summoned to Washington to answer for their role in the arrests of Chinese journalist Shi Tao and Wang Xiaoning. Yahoo agreed to settle with affected Chinese dissidents, paying them undisclosed compensation. Yang stated, “After meeting with the families, it was clear to me what we had to do to make this right for them, for Yahoo, and for the future.” In response, Democratic Congressman Tom Lantos, chairman of the United States House Committee on Foreign Affairs, stated, “It took a tongue-lashing from Congress before these high-tech titans did the right thing and coughed up some concrete assistance for the family of a journalist whom Yahoo had helped send to jail. What a disgrace.”
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