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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 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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