WCIT Statement

Ginger Paque gpaque at gmail.com
Sun Nov 4 08:43:50 EST 2012


Great comments and voices at the Best Bits meeting. Anriette: not just
great ideas, great voices 'around the room'. What about people listening
online? One of the Best Bits, strategies, useful paths to working together
(listening to the current speaker) is that the next meeting should include
those who cannot be in the room! Email, Twitter, Skype--even the occasional
acknowledgement from a speaker or moderator. Wonderful discussions! I do
hope a wider range of civil society will be included as possible. Thanks.
Ginger

Ginger (Virginia) Paque

VirginiaP at diplomacy.edu
Diplo Foundation
Internet Governance Capacity Building Programme
www.diplomacy.edu/ig
**
**



On 4 November 2012 06:41, Carlos A. Afonso <ca at cafonso.ca> wrote:

> Hi Pranesh, please add as signatory Instituto Nupef, Rio de Janeiro
> (Carlos A. Afonso).
>
> frt rgds
>
> --c.a.
>
> Carlos A. Afonso
>
> Pranesh Prakash <pranesh at cis-india.org> escreveu:
> Dear all,
> The participants in Baku decided to incorporate small revisions without
> re-opening the entire text.  Here's the final version:
>
> http://igcaucus.org:9001/p/wcit_statement
>
> Currently, we have 10 organizations that are signatories to it:
>
> Access (Brett Solomon)
> Bangladesh NGOs Network for Radio and Communication (AHM. Bazlur Rahman)
> Centre for Internet and Society (Pranesh Prakash)
> Center for Democracy & Technology
> Consumers International
> Electronic Frontier Finland (Tapani Tarvainen)
> Global Partners & Associates (Andrew Puddephatt)
> InternetNZ
> ONG Derechos Digitales (Claudio Ruiz)
> OpenMedia (Steve Anderson)
>
> As far as I can see, we have until the 7th before we close signatories
> and endorsements.  (These two words are being used to distinguish
> between those who participated in framing it and those who agree with it.)
>
> Given that anyone can edit the document, if you are adding your
> organization's name, I would request you to write your name in
> parentheses.  We can decide later that we wish to remove names from all
> organizations.
>
> Regards,
> Pranesh
>
> Pranesh Prakash wrote [2012-11-04 12:20]:
> > Dear all,
> > Here is the statement of civil society members and groups participating
> > in a pre-IGF meeting at Baku in 2012 as drafted after the morning
> > session on Sunday, November 4, 2012.
> >
> > Please indicate your and your group's support of this statement on this
> > mailing list or directly at the end of this Etherpad document:
> > <http://igcaucus.org:9001/p/wcit_statement>.
> >
> > Given our deliberation on these both yesterday and today — and the fact
> > that we would not wish to open this particular statement up to extensive
> > revision again — I would request people to raise comments on this
> > mailing list only if you believe the drafters have committed an
> > egregious mistake in capturing the agreement present in the room. Please
> > do not leave comments on the Etherpad document.
> >
> > Regards,
> > Pranesh
> >
> > ====
> >
> > Statement of civil society members and groups participating in a pre-IGF
> > meeting at Baku in 2012.
> >
> > The process of the revision of the International Telecommunications
> > Regulations (ITRs) have not been sufficiently inclusive and transparent,
> > despite some recent efforts to facilitate some public participation.
> > Fundamental to the framing of public policy must be the pursuit of the
> > public interest and fundamental human rights, and we urge member states
> > to uphold and protect these values.
> >
> > We as civil society organizations wish to engage with the World
> > Conference on International Telecommunications (WCIT) process in this
> > spirit. Member-states, in most cases, have not held open, broad-based,
> > public consultations in the lead up to the WCIT, nor have they indicated
> > such process for the WCIT itself.
> >
> > In order to address this deficiency, and as a minimum, we would urge:
> > * All member states and regional groups to make their proposals
> > available to the public in sufficient time to allow for meaningful
> > public participation;
> > * All delegates to support proposals to open sessions of the WCIT
> > meeting to the public;
> > * The ITU Secretariat to increase transparency of the WCIT including
> > live webcast with the video, audio, and text transcripts, as far as
> > possible, to enable participation by all, including persons with
> > disabilities;
> > * The ITU Secretariat, member-states, and regional groups to make as
> > much documentation publicly available as possible on the ITU's website,
> > so that civil society can provide substantive input on proposals as they
> > are made available;
> > * Member-states to encourage and facilitate civil society participation
> > their national delegations;
> > * The ITU to create spaces during the WCIT for civil society to express
> > their views, as was done during the WSIS process.
> >
> > Given the uncertainty about the nature of final proposals that will be
> > presented, we urge delegates that the following criteria be applied to
> > any proposed revisions of the ITRs.
> >
> > * That any proposed revisions are confined to the traditional core
> > mandate of the ITU and scope of the ITRs, where international regulation
> > is required around technical issue limited to basic telecommunications
> > networks and interoperability standards.
> > * There should be no revisions to the ITRs that involve regulation of
> > the Internet Protocol and above.
> > * There should be no revisions that could have a negative impact on
> > affordable access to the Internet or the public's rights to privacy and
> > freedom of expression.
> >
> > More positively we call upon the ITU to promote principles of net
> > neutrality, open standards, affordable access and universal service, and
> > effective competition.
> >
> > Signed by:
> >
> > ====
> >
>
>
> --
> Pranesh Prakash
> Policy Director
> Centre for Internet and Society
> T: +91 80 40926283 | W: http://cis-india.org
> PGP ID: 0x1D5C5F07 | Twitter: @pranesh_prakash
>
>
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