[WSIS CS-Plenary] GFC meeting today

[Milton Mueller]

I agree vigorously with Ralf's perspective on this. I suspect that the
desire to confine post-WSIS activity to the MDGs reflects a desire on
the part of some actors to avoid more meaningful reforms.

However, I would like to know more about what you mean (Ralf) when you
assert that "all the other important things we have fought for will be
lost" if post-WSIS dialogue is confined to MDGs. 

What I want to know is: how will those "important things" be GAINED
post-WSIS if dialogue is not confined to MDGs? 

Will it be through the creation of the global forum proposed by WGIG? 

Will it be through the WSIS Declaration? 

Will it be through a new framework convention?

What? 

>>> bendrath at zedat.fu-berlin.de 09/07/05 12:14 PM >>>
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Thanks for your report, Chantal.

> Here is a short summary of the GFC meeting of this morning. And also
in
>  the annex a statment made on behalf of the informal coalition on 
> financing.
I would love to see the other CS speakers at that meeting sending
their
statements to this list. I have only seen the ones from you (finance 
coalition) and Jean-Louis (CSDPTT) yet.

One remark, and this goes back to the heart of the political debate we

already had in WSIS phase one:

> /c. About evaluation and policy debate/
> 
> According to ambassador Karklins, civil society and other
organisations
>  should not fear that the topic of the information society disappears

> from the international agenda after Tunis, because of the link
between 
> the MDG's Summit and the WSIS Summit. The mention of WSIS in the
MDG's
> documents means, for Karklin, that the topic of ICTs for development
> will remain on the agenda at least until 2015.

This is really not enough, and civil society should not buy into this.
If
WSIS only stays on the agenda through the ICT4D discourse, then all
the
other important things we have fought for will be lost. This
especially
relates to the human rights dimension of the information society.

We can already clearly see it here in the EU: The governments have
started 
again to see WSIS as purely a development summit. But they also have to

look at themselves and how human rights can be supported and
strengthened 
in the European information society. Currently, they forget about human

rights in the WSIS context (or only think "Tunisia"), while at the same

time the EU Council of Ministers will again discuss another proposal
for 
mandatory retention of all communications traffic and location data in

Europe for 6 to 12 month at its next meeting on Friday, which would
imply 
a massive breach of human rights principles.

Therefore, we must insist that implementation is assured for WSIS, but

that it definitely is not constrained to development issues.

Best, Ralf
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