Hi Damon,
We confirm receipt of this motion and it will be posted on the motion wiki page for the 15 Jan 2026 Council meeting:
https://icann-community.atlassian.net/wiki/x/QYA0J
GNSO Council, this will need someone to second it. Please email the full GNSO Council mailing list to do so:
council@icann.org
Thank you.
Kind regards,
Terri
Policy Team Supporting the GNSO
From:
"Ashcraft, Damon via council" <council@icann.org>
Reply-To: "Ashcraft, Damon" <dashcraft@swlaw.com>
Date: Friday, December 19, 2025 at 10:01 AM
To: "council@icann.org" <council@icann.org>
Subject: [council] Motion re: IRT on IGO-INGO Curative Rights
Dear Fellow Councilors,
As you may know, I am the Council liaison to the IRT on IGO-INGO Curative Rights project. One of the principal issues that this IRT is working on is how UDRPs are handled when the complainant is an IGO/IGNO. These organizations are not
always subject to court jurisdiction so the other option for dispute resolution is an arbitration proceeding. Specifically, we are looking at the issue of when can parties exit a UDRP proceeding and proceed to arbitration. The Final Report could be interpreted
in a manner that would limit when parties could proceed to arbitration but the IRT generally thinks the approach should be that parties can exit the UDRP at any time and proceed to arbitration if they so choose. This would make these UDRPs for IGO/IGNOs have
the same provisions as regular UDPRs whereby parties can pretty much opt out at any time for another dispute resolution proceeding. The IRT has requested Council’s input on this issue and along those lines, I will be submitting a motion for a vote at our
January meeting. A draft motion is attached along with a letter that explains this issue.
On a personal level, I think the IRT is absolutely correct in their interpretation. It wouldn’t make sense to have UDRP and URS proceedings for NGO/INGOs have significantly different mechanisms to exit them for alternative dispute resolution
proceedings.
Finally, I want to reiterate that this is NOT an issue of ICANN staff and the IRT having a significant disagreement as to what the final report says. Rather, the IRT recognizes that this is a significant issue and we wanted Council to
be aware of it and the provide guidance on the desired interpretation.
Please see the attached and let me know if you have any questions.
Thanks, Damon
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