Human rights advocates from around the world have written an open letter to the U.S. government urging U.S. lawmakers to support the use of Bitcoin.
According to a report, 21 human rights supporters from 20 countries sent a letter to members of the U.S. Congress urging them to support the use of Bitcoin as a payment method.
Bitcoin gives people power in countries where local currencies are collapsing. The letter came in the wake of a number of prominent technologists warning Congress about the dangers of crypto and efforts by legislators to make digital assets more available for public use.
The letter notes that tens of millions of individuals living in authoritarian regimes, unstable economies, and under-developed financial systems have similarly turned to cryptocurrencies.
The letter stated:
“Bitcoin provides financial inclusion and empowerment because it is open and permissionless. We are not industry financiers or professional lobbyists but humanitarians and democracy advocates who have used bitcoin to assist people at risk when other options have failed”
Chief strategy officer for the Human Rights Foundation, Alex Gladstein (one of the letter’s authors) noted that 23 of the 25 technologists who issued the anti-crypto warning were from the U.S. or Europe, pointing out that they benefit from the privilege of dollars and euros.
In the letter the highlighted countries are Nigeria, Turkey and Argentina as an examples of countries where fiat currencies have become destabilized due to very high inflation, leading individuals to turn to digital assets as a preferred alternative, because their fiat currencies have been loosing value for years.
