Congratulations Michael Katundu -------------------------------------------------------------------- Secretary-General SG/A/1006 PI/1717 Department of Public Information • News and Media Division • New York SECRETARY-GENERAL ESTABLISHES ADVISORY GROUP TO ASSIST HIM IN CONVENING INTERNET GOVERNANCE FORUM United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan today established an Advisory Group to assist him in convening the Internet Governance Forum, a new forum for a multi-stakeholder dialogue on Internet governance. The Group includes 46 members from Government, the private sector and civil society, including the academic and technical communities, who represent all regions of the world (see list below). It is chaired by Nitin Desai, the Secretary-General’s Special Adviser for the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS), who may also select special advisers to assist him. The Advisory Group will meet on 22 and 23 May in Geneva, following an open consultation on 19 May, also in Geneva. Its main task is to prepare the substantive agenda and programme for the first meeting of the Internet Governance Forum, which is to be held in Athens from 30 October to 2 November. Decisions on how to prepare subsequent meetings and on any future structure and working methods of the Forum will be taken in light of the experiences gained during the preparatory process for the Athens meeting. The Internet Governance Forum is an outcome of the Tunis phase of the WSIS, which took place in November 2005. In the Tunis Agenda for the Information Society, Governments asked the Secretary-General to convene the Forum, giving it the mandate to discuss the main public policy issues related to Internet governance, in order to foster the Internet’s sustainability, robustness, security, stability and development. Governments called for the Forum to be convened in an “open and inclusive process”. Accordingly, the Advisory Group will carry out its work in an open, inclusive and transparent manner, and will seek to make the best possible use of electronic working methods, including online consultations. List of members Chairman Desai, Nitin Delhi/Mumbai - Special Adviser to the Secretary-General for the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) Members Agrawala, Pankaj Delhi - Joint Secretary, Department of Information Technology, Ministry of Communications and Information Technology Akinsanmi, Titilayo Johannesburg - Programme Manager, SchoolNet Africa; Global Facilitator of the WSIS Youth Caucus Akplogan, Adiel Port Louis - Chief Executive Officer, Regional Internet Registry (RIR) for Africa - AfriNIC Al-Shatti, Qusai Kuwait City - Deputy Chairman of Kuwait Information Technology Society (KITS) Bayramov, Ayaz Baku - Head of Department for International Relations and Cooperation with NGOs, Ministry of Communications and Information Technologies Bicalho, José Brasilia - Member of the Brazilian Internet Steering Committee; Advisor to the Board of Directors of the National Telecommunications Agency (Anatel) Clarke, Trevor Geneva - Permanent Representative of Barbados to the United Nations Office at Geneva Daftardar, Abdullah M. Riyadh - Senior Executive, Communications and Information Technology Commission Dardailler, Daniel Nice - Associate Chair for Europe, World Wide Web Consortium (W3C); Member, Board of Directors, Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) D’Costa, Valerie Singapore - International Director, Info-Communication Development Authority, Singapore Diop Diagne, Ndeye Maimouna Dakar - Directrice des NTIC, Ministère des Postes, Télécommunications et Nouvelles Technologies de l’Information et de la Communication (NTIC) Disspain, Chris Carlton - Victoria, Chair, Country Code Names Supporting Organization (ccNSO) Council; Chief Executive Officer, .au Registry Echeberría, Raúl Montevideo - Executive Director/Chief Executive Officer, Latin America and Caribbean Internet Addresses Registry (LACNIC) El-Nawawy, Mohamed Cairo - Chairman and Managing Director, TE Data Fältström, Patrik Stockholm - Consulting Engineer, Cisco Systems; Member, Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF); Member, Swedish Government Information Technology Policy and Strategy Group Gallagher, Michael D. Washington D.C. - Chairman of the Communications Group, Perkins Coie LLC Graham, Bill Ottawa - Director, International Telecommunication Policy and Coordination, Industry Canada Gross, Robin D. San Francisco, California - Executive Director, IP Justice Hassan, Ayesha Paris - Senior Policy Manager, e-Business, Information Technology, and Telecoms, Executive in charge of Information and Communication Technology Policy, International Chamber of Commerce (ICC) Hellmonds, Peter Munich - Vice President, Public and International Affairs, Siemens AG Hofmann, Jeanette Berlin - Researcher, Social Science Research Center Iriarte, Erick Lima - Executive Director, Alfa-Redi Kafi, Abdullah Dacca - Managing Director, J A N Associates Limited; former President, Bangladesh Computer Society Karklinš, Janis Geneva - Permanent Representative of Latvia to the United Nations Office at Geneva Katoh, Masanobu Tokyo - Corporate Vice President; President, Law and Intellectual Property Unit and Security Export Control Headquarters, Fujitsu Limited Katundu, Michael Nairobi - Principal Officer, Information Technology Communications Commission Khan, Masood Geneva - Permanent Representative of Pakistan to the United Nations Office at Geneva Kovács, Kálmán Budapest - Minister of Informatics and Communications Lohento, Gemma Brice (Ken) Dakar - Panos Institute West Africa, Coordinator, Center for International information and communication technology Policies for Central and West Africa (CIPACO) Markovski, Veni Sofia - Chair of the President’s Information Technology Advisory Committee; Member, Board of Directors, ICANN Oliver, Colin Canberra - General Manager, International Communications, Department of Communications, Information Technology and the Arts Papadatos, George Athens – Minister Plenipotentiary, Department of International Organizations, Ministry of Foreign Affairs Peake, Adam Tokyo - Executive Research Fellow/Associate Professor, Center for Global Communications (GLOCOM), International University of Japan Pisanty, Alejandro Mexico City - Director of Computing Academic Services, Universidad Autónoma de México; Director ISOC Mexico; Vice Chair, Board of Directors, ICANN Quaynor, Nii Accra - Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Network Computer Systems; President, Internet Society of Ghana Sha'ban, Charles Amman - Executive Director, Regional Office, Abu-Ghazaleh Intellectual Property (AGIP) Shears, Matthew Copenhagen - Director of Public Policy, Internet Society (ISOC) Sierra, Colombo Buenos Aires - Chief of Cabinet, Ministry of Foreign Affairs Singer, Christian Vienna - Head of Division, Federal Ministry of Transportation Slizen, Vitaliy Moscow - Head of Department, Information and Communication Ministry Swinehart, Theresa Marina del Rey, California - Vice President, Global and Strategic Partnerships, ICANN Taylor, Emily Oxford - Nominet (.uk), Director of Legal and Policy Wessberg, Arne Helsinki - President, European Broadcasting Union (EBU); President, International Institute of Communication Xiaokun, Yang Geneva - First Secretary, Permanent Mission of China to the United Nations Office at Geneva Zangl, Peter Brussels - Deputy Director-General, Directorate General for Information Society and Media, European Commission For further information, please visit www.intgovforum.org or contact Markus Kummer, Executive Coordinator, Secretariat of the Internet Governance Forum, tel.: +41 0 22 917 54 88, e-mail: mkummer@unog.ch.