IAC Report to Council 28/10/05
The committee has produced a Terms of Reference in the form approved by Council at its last meeting. This is attached and recommended for Council's approval.
The following activities have taken place:
APTLD - Peter Dengate Thrush attended the Jordan meeting as APTLD chair. Jordan Carter attended as APTLD staff and Keith Davidson for INZ (since he was 'passing' on his way back from Geneva). The committee expects to receive reports on this meeting soon and will forward to Council.
CENTR - Jordan Carter visited the CENTR Secretariat in Brussels after the APTLD meeting in Amman, to meet the staff and learn lessons for application to APTLD' s operations in future.
WSIS - In response to a request from the New Zealand government, Keith attended the third preparatory commission of the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS PrepCom-3 in the vernacular). Keith attended as part of the New Zealand government delegation, which was just as well because civil society representatives were all made to leave the meeting. This as a two week drafting session which ultimately failed to reach agreement and ended in a fair degree of disarray. There will be further meetings before the Tunis summit in mid November, although it is questionable whether any progress will be made on Internet governance before or at the summit. Keith has produced the attached reports on WSIS, with the main report going forward to Government as an appendix to the New Zealand delegation documents. The personal observations and diary notes which may be of interest to those who are following the WSIS process are available from Keith.
The IAC has also approved a $500 grant to assist Don Hollander with travel arrangements to attend the Tunis summit. Don is attending as Chair of the 2020 Trust.
ICANN - The committee has agreed, with NZOC and ICANNZ06, on the InternetNZ delegation to attend Vancouver. It will comprise Keith, Andy Linton and the conference organiser from ICANNZ06, the DNC from NZOC, and David Farrar and myself from IAC. We do not expect to send such a large party in future, but this has been arranged largely to meet the demands of the upcoming Wellington meeting.
In response to the issues around Internet governance IAC has arranged a briefing and workshop for Council at its next meeting.
Recommendation
- That the report of the International Affairs Committee be received.
- That the attached draft Terms of Reference for the International Affairs Committee be ratified.
