FYI. I spoke to Heather Dryden when I met her at the INET in Geneva last week and having already discussed the subject, this is our way forward. Kind regards, Olivier -------- Message original -------- Sujet: Action Items from GAC-ALAC Costa Rica meeting Date : Mon, 30 Apr 2012 21:51:17 +0100 De : Olivier MJ Crepin-Leblond <ocl@gih.com> Pour : Heather.Dryden Dryden <Heather.Dryden@ic.gc.ca> Copie à : Olivier MJ Crepin-Leblond <ocl@gih.com>, ICANN AtLarge Staff <staff@atlarge.icann.org>, Evan Leibovitch <evan@telly.org>, Carlton Samuels <carlton.samuels@gmail.com>, Jean-Jacques Subrenat <jjs.global@gmail.com> Dear Heather, after reviewing the transcript of our very successful meeting in Costa Rica, I am now following up with you regarding the two action items from the meeting. 1. Following-up on human rights issues feeding into the policy rule-making, I extended an invitation to all interested GAC members, to our ALAC Registrant Rights Working Group which is open and would welcome input. This working group is tasked with extending the concept of "Registrant Rights" into the rights of Internet users with regards to Domain Names -- since it is not only registrants that are affected by Domain Names but also every Internet user out there. I therefore invite any of your members interested in taking part in such a group, either officially as a GAC member, but also individually, whichever is more doable, to email me and staff@atlarge.icann.org and we'll take it from there. I note from the transcript that during the meeting, there was interest from the EU Commission, Portugal, Australia, Mexico and the Council of Europe and hope that they will volunteer to follow-up in the working group. 2. Action Item: ALAC and GAC to form a small working group which will draft a joint statement on ICANN Conflicts of Interest There is very successful precedent in a small working group being set-up to draft a joint GAC-ALAC statement with the Joint Statement on Applicant Support, which can be found on: http://www.atlarge.icann.org/correspondence/correspondence-04aug11-en.htm The ALAC has taken a very strong line about the current ICANN Conflicts of Interest and has drafted TWO statements submitted to a recent public comment period. I invite you and your members to read them from: http://www.atlarge.icann.org/correspondence/correspondence-02apr12-en.htm http://www.atlarge.icann.org/correspondence/correspondence-24apr12-en.htm The action item from our meeting in Costa Rica calls for a small working group to draft a joint GAC-ALAC Statement and once again, I'd be happy to receive emails from volunteers, Cc'ed to staff@atlarge.icann.org . I note from the session's transcript that Australia and the European Commission contributed to the dialogue and that this needs to be explored. As a reminder, Jean-Jacques Subrenat's suggestion for a starting point was: /"And what I'm thinking of is that there should be a closer examination of, perhaps, real cases of conflict of interest which appear in ICANN, and to study what these conflicts of interest are. Are they supposed? Are they real? Are they perceived? On the one hand. And on the other hand, it's to try to define more precisely the limits within which it is possible to operate. For instance, it so happens that someone noticed and put on a blog recently that at a recent vote of the board of ICANN, nine of the board voting members were conflicted. I mean, that's something which is quite -- quite amazing."/ I should therefore be grateful if you could forward these follow-up action items to your members and look forward to receiving an enthusiastic response. The GAC and the ALAC have a very important part to play in making sure that ICANN acts in the public interest and we have to seize the opportunity of this synergy to make sure it indeed does so. To miss this opportunity would be letting down 2.4Bn Internet users out there. Kindest regards, Olivier MJ Crépin-Leblond ALAC Chair