Sweden's Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt says he has stressed the merits of uncensored Internet access in a meeting with Chinese Vice President Xi Jinping. Reinfeldt says they discussed human rights, democracy and the freedom of expression "and I especially emphasized ... the significance of the Internet in that context." Last week Google stopped censoring the Internet for China by shifting its search engine off the mainland. The Chinese government can still censor Web pages it deems sensitive with its own filters.

THE Obama administration has questioned the Rudd government's plan to introduce an internet filter, saying it runs contrary to the US's foreign policy of encouraging an open internet to spread economic growth and global security. Officials from the State Department have raised the issue with Australian counterparts as the US mounts a diplomatic assault on internet censorship by governments worldwide. The news is a blow to Communications Minister Stephen Conroy, who is defending the plan for internet companies to mandatorily block illegal and abhorrent websites -- for instance, child pornography -- but faces growing opposition. While considered a noble idea, any filter is considered by many -- even within the Labor caucus -- to be unworkable and a misdirection of resources away from enforcement and policing.

worrisome confrontation is escalating between the United States and China. Washington charges that Beijing is unfairly bolstering Chinese exports by keeping its currency artificially low and is troubled by Beijing’s dispute with Google over Internet censorship. Beijing is telling the United States to mind its own business and is chafing over U.S. arms sales to Taiwan and President Obama’s recent meeting with the Dalai Lama. With the anger on both sides intensifying, American and Chinese leaders urgently need to take steps to defuse the situation. Otherwise, China’s continuing rise may soon result in a classic rivalry between reigning hegemon and ascending challenger. I have just returned to Washington from Beijing; the mutual antagonism is palpable in both capitals. Amid a stubborn slump in U.S. employment, Washington is awash with disgruntlement over the trade imbalance with China. In one of the few remnants of bipartisanship, Democrats and Republicans alike are calling for retaliation against China’s alleged manipulation of its currency. Talk in Washington is that Beijing’s once-cautious foreign policy has suddenly become assertive and caustic. Beijing is abuzz over the accusations from Washington. Chinese leaders contend that Americans are blaming China for economic problems that are homegrown. In a recent press conference, Prime Minister Wen Jiabao denied that the Chinese currency is undervalued and asserted that responsibility for “serious disruptions” to the China-U.S. relationship “does not lie with the Chinese side but the U.S. side.” Angry calls for the country’s leadership to stand up to American intimidation dominate the Chinese press and blogosphere.

Internet censorship is an increasingly hot topic for U.S. legislators, a group of whom announced the launch of a Global Internet Freedom Caucus on Wednesday to highlight the issue and develop legislation. Meanwhile, the House of Representatives is weighing two bills that could expand efforts to combat censorship by the U.S. government. But Google’s experience in China over the past two months has led some to question whether legislators’ involvement helps or hurts the government’s cause, even as Google urges legislators to become more involved in such efforts. Sentiment among Chinese Internet users is far from being unanimously in support of Google’s decision to defy the wishes of Chinese censors. Some prominent commentators have outspokenly praised Google as a champion for free expression, but most Internet watchers say Chinese-language discussion on the topic is now laced with skepticism because of blurred boundaries between the Internet giant and the U.S. government.