UN to hold consultations on new Net governance body

IDG News Service - The United Nations will launch the first round of consultations next month on creating a new Internet governance body, as agreed by delegates who attended a global Net summit in Tunis, Tunisia, last year.
The UN, which hosted the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) in November, is welcoming all stakeholders to attend the consultations, which will take place in Geneva Feb. 16 and 17, according to a statement yesterday by Swiss diplomat Markus Kummer, who had previously participated in the WSIS working group on Internet governance.
The consultations will focus on developing "a common understanding among all stakeholders on the nature and character" of the proposed Internet Governance Forum and to prepare for the first meeting of the new body, to take place in Athens before the end of this year, the statement said.
Internet governance was arguably the most controversial issue at the WSIS, threatening to undermine the entire summit. To defuse the heated war for political control of the Internet, UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan proposed a temporary cease-fire of sorts by offering to create the forum. Government delegates in Tunis agreed to the proposal.
Although the forum itself will have no oversight or decision-making function, some governments view it as an opportunity to sow the seeds for a new Internet governance regime.
Others, notably the U.S., view it in much the same way they viewed the WSIS itself: as a multilateral, multistakeholder, nonbinding body with a broad mandate but no real power -- except to meet in Greece.
At the WSIS and in talks leading up to the summit, the U.S. government reiterated that it had no intention of relinquishing its unique position in managing this critical global infrastructure.
President George Bush said the Internet must continue to be a private-sector-led initiative under U.S. government supervision. He was joined by several U.S. congressmen and U.S. companies, including IBM, Google Inc. and Microsoft Corp., which spoke in favor of maintaining the status quo.
David Gross, ambassador of the Bureau of Economic and Business Affairs at the U.S. Department of State and the person who had led the U.S. delegation, said in an earlier interview that the Internet is best served by the bottom-up, private-sector approach and should continue to be run that way.