Dear Councillors, Ahead of the official Council minutes, the following resolution was passed at the GNSO Council meeting on 13 November 2014. Adoption of a Charter for a Cross Community Working Group on Enhancing ICANN Accountability Whereas, 1. The National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) has requested that ICANN "convene a multistakeholder process to develop a plan to transition the U.S. government stewardship role" with regard to the IANA Functions and related root zone management. 2. During discussions around the transition process, the community raised the broader topic of the impact of the change on ICANN's accountability given its historical contractual relationship with the United States and NTIA. Accountability in this context is defined, according to the Netmundial multistakeholder statement[1], as the existence of mechanisms for independent checks and balances as well as for review and redress. 3. The concerns raised during these discussions around the transition process indicate that the level of trust into the existing ICANN accountability mechanisms does not yet meet some stakeholder's expectations. Considering that the NTIA has stressed that it was expecting community consensus regarding the transition, this gap between the current situation and stakeholder expectations may prevent the transition to proceed. 4. A DT was formed with participants, amongst others, from the ccNSO, GNSO, ASO and ALAC to develop a charter for a Cross Community Working Group on Enhancing ICANN Accountability. 5. The DT delivered the proposed charter for consideration to all the ICANN Supporting Organizations and Advisory Committees for consideration (see: http://gnso.icann.org/en/drafts/enhancing-accountability-charter-03nov14-en....) Resolved, 1. The GNSO Council approves the Charter (http://gnso.icann.org/en/drafts/enhancing-accountability-charter-03nov14-en....) and appoints Thomas Rickert as the GNSO Council liaison and GNSO co-chair to the CWG. 2. Each GNSO Stakeholder Group will identify one member for the CWG by 20 November taking into account the charter requirement that best efforts should be made to ensure that members: · Have sufficient expertise to participate in the applicable subject matter (see for example https://www.icann.org/resources/pages/enhancing-accountability-faqs-2014-08-... for areas identified for expertise); · Commit to actively participate in the activities of the CWG on an ongoing and long-term basis; and · Where appropriate, solicit and communicate the views and concerns of individuals in the organization that appoints them. 3. The GNSO will collaborate with the other SOs and ACs to issue a call for participants to join the CWG, each in accordance with its own rules. [1] http://netmundial.br/wp-content/uploads/2014/04/NETmundial-Multistakeholder-... Please let me know if you have any questions. Thank you. Kind regards. Glen Glen de Saint Géry GNSO Secretariat gnso.secretariat@gnso.icann.org http://gnso.icann.org