17 November 2005 A press conference, on 16 November attended by Nobel Peace Prize winner, Shirin Ebadi, at the Tunis headquarters of the Tunisian League for Human Rights (LTDH), in effect, became the first unofficial meeting of the Citizens Summit on Information Technology (CSIS) The Tunisian government has systematically blocked the alternative summit’s preparatory meetings and planned workshops and events in flagrant breach of the right to freedom of expression and association. In doing so, the Tunisian Government has demonstrated contempt for the Geneva Principles* and for their obligations under the UN Declaration on Human Rights Defenders and international human rights law.
Leading representatives of International and Tunisian Civil Society committed themselves to continuing the struggle for the basic rights to freedom of expression and association in Tunisia in front of the audience of over 200 journalists, diplomats and NGO members. The Mayor of Geneva, echoing the statements of the President of Switzerland’s comment at the official World Summit, said that rights freedom of expression and assembly were universal and not the domain of one culture 
