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It is unfortunate that an attempt was not made to share a pre-final
statement with the group. I tend to disagree, on principle, with
adopting 'take it or leave it' approaches to development of
statements. This was not a controversial area, and we could have
tried drafting a common statement...<br>
<br>
Anyway, a few comments<br>
<br>
One, can you pl provide the link to the quoted November statement -
which statement and whose statement is this ...<br>
<br>
Secondly, I could not understand the reason and implications of the
following sentence<br>
<br>
"Rather than seeking to address additional issues, we urge the
Secretary-General to move forward in engaging all stakeholders to
implement these opinions."<br>
<br>
Why should civil society recommend that ITU takes up issues like
Internet Exchanges and IPv6 adoption (subject matter of the
'opinions') and not for instance net neutrality, which is not among
the subjects covered in the opinions. Why this artificial line about
what Internet issues ITU may work on? <br>
<br>
Thanks<br>
<br>
parminder <br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
<div class="moz-cite-prefix">On Friday 10 May 2013 08:05 AM, Jeremy
Malcolm wrote:<br>
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<blockquote cite="mid:518C5CFE.8010801@ciroap.org" type="cite">
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With the ITU's World Telecommunication and ICT Policy Forum (WTPF)
coming up next week, I would like to encourage everyone to read
and - if they agree with it - to endorse this statement, which a
group of us who will be participating at WTPF have drafted
collaboratively:<br>
<br>
<a moz-do-not-send="true" class="moz-txt-link-freetext"
href="http://bestbits.net/wtpf-2013">http://bestbits.net/wtpf-2013</a><br>
<br>
Please forgive us for not having a broader drafting process this
time, but it was mainly due to shortness of time. In any case,
the text has been drafted consistently with the previous Best Bits
statement to the ITU.<br>
<br>
Please feel free to reach out into other networks for
endorsements, too. There are buttons on the page that will enable
you to share automatically with Twitter and Facebook.<br>
<br>
I am currently working to overcome a technical limitation which
means that individuals' names must be listed where an organisation
has endorsed. I plan to keep working on this today, but didn't
want to hold up distribution of the statement any longer.<br>
<br>
Thanks to Deborah, Joana and everyone else who helped to put this
together so quickly. The full text is shown below:<br>
<br>
<p>We reaffirm the goals and principles of the statement submitted
to the ITU Secretariat in November 2012 in which we urged member
states to implement inclusive and transparent ITU processes and
uphold and protect the public interest and fundamental human
rights.</p>
<p>These fundamental human rights must be at the forefront of
internet governance and ITU convenings, including the WTPF.
Internet policy topics, including but not limited to affordable
access, development, openness and access to knowledge, net
neutrality, privacy, and security must be considered through the
framework of human rights, in particular freedom of expression.</p>
<p>We welcome progress made by the Secretary-General and the
Informal Experts Group in achieving consensus on the six draft
opinions. These begin to address important goals, including the
expansion of key internet infrastructure in order to reduce
costs for those in need; the reaffirmation of multistakeholder
processes; and the promotion of transparent and inclusive
enhanced cooperation. Rather than seeking to address additional
issues, we urge the Secretary-General to move forward in
engaging all stakeholders to implement these opinions.</p>
<p>Unfortunately, we must object to the Secretary-General’s
report’s framing of the debate on multistakeholderism. The WTPF
has not yet achieved open and participatory internet policy
making. In endeavoring to foster multistakeholder consensus, it
is critical that the WTPF facilitate civil society’s
participation as an independent and authoritative voice. The ITU
should, for this and future fora, bring all stakeholders
together to work on implementing WTPF opinions at the national,
regional, and global levels. This means creating spaces for
civil society to express their views, for example through an
online platform for comment that is part of the official WTPF
record, through speaking rights as was done during the WSIS
process, as well as providing for both remote participation and
live webcasting of the WTPF meeting. Video, audio, and text
transcripts will further enables participation by all, including
persons with disabilities.</p>
<p>Open and transparent participation will augment the critical
efforts toward broadband connectivity, IXP promotion, enhanced
cooperation, and IPv6 deployment that the WTPF is undertaking
with these opinions. We look forward to working together with
the ITU as it pursues these policies and institutes a
multistakeholder structure that can achieve the goals
articulated herein in a manner consistent with the public
interest and fundamental human rights.<br>
</p>
<div class="moz-signature">-- <br>
<p style="font-size:9.0pt;color:black"><b>Dr Jeremy Malcolm<br>
Senior Policy Officer<br>
Consumers International | the global campaigning voice for
consumers</b><br>
Office for Asia-Pacific and the Middle East<br>
Lot 5-1 Wisma WIM, 7 Jalan Abang Haji Openg, TTDI, 60000 Kuala
Lumpur, Malaysia<br>
Tel: +60 3 7726 1599</p>
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