Colleagues, I was pleased to read this, and wanted to share with you. But that's just the second registrar in that huge place called Africa. Methinks we still have a long way to go, both from the continent and from ICANN sides. A nice next step would be a new gTLD Registry agreement for Africa: how about that? Congratulations to Mouhamet Diop, to all those in the ICANN community who have contributed to make this happen, and to all of us for our hard voluntary free work. I'd like to encourage us to keep thinking hard out of the box.Thanks, Mawaki --- Anne-Rachel Inné <annerachel@gmail.com> wrote:

Date: Tue, 15 May 2007 07:59:25 +0200 From: "Anne-Rachel Inné" <annerachel@gmail.com> To: africann@afrinic.net Subject: [AfrICANN-discuss] ICANN Accredits First Registrar in Senegal

Dear All, Please join in congratulating Mouhamet Diop for the birth of KHEWEUL.COM, the first registrar accredited by ICANN in West Africa! Good luck Mouhamet. ar

--------------------------------------------------------- ICANN Accredits First Registrar in Senegal

14 May 2007

*MARINA DEL REY, Calif.*: The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) has signed its first accreditation agreement with a Senegal-based Registrar – Kheweul.com SA from Dakar.

"We have accreditation agreements with more than 890 Registrars across the world – and this is only the second in Africa," said Anne-Rachel Inné, ICANN's Regional Liaison for Africa. "ICANN is continually working to expand its international participation and representation – and this agreement is an important step forward in that."

Kheweul.com has been accredited to register domain names from the .biz, .com, .info, .name, .net, .org, and .pro top-level domains.

"We're proud to be the first ICANN-accredited Registrar in West Africa and the second in Africa," said Mouhamet Diop, Chairman and CEO of Kheweul.com. "Kheweul.Com is going to work closely with all African country-code top-level domain managers and all world-wide registries to provide domain name services to local African communities. We also plan to promote the digitalization of African cultural heritage and help the preserve of African multimedia content."

ICANN successfully introduced competition in the registrar marketplace that has resulted in the over 890 ICANN accredited registrars now offering a range of registration services. A complete list of accredited registrars is available at: http://www.icann.org/registrars/accredited-list.html.

ICANN has a contractual relationship with all accredited registrars that clearly sets forth the obligations of accredited registrars. This information is available at: http://www.icann.org/registrars/ra-agreement-17may01.htm.

* About ICANN: *

ICANN is responsible for the global coordination of the Internet's system of unique identifiers like domain names (like .org, .museum and country codes like .uk) and the addresses used in a variety of Internet protocols that help computers reach each other over the Internet. Careful management of these resources is vital to the Internet's operation, so ICANN's global stakeholders meet regularly to develop policies that ensure the Internet's ongoing security and stability. ICANN is an internationally organized, public benefit non-profit company. For more information please visit: www.icann.org.

*About Kheweul.Com: *

Kheweul.Com is a Senegalese private company based in Senegal, registered under the African Jurisdiction, called OHADA, and will serve all African countries for any purposes related to Domain Names business. For more information please visit: www.kheweul.com.

Mouhamet Diop's bio and involvement with the international functions of ICANN are online at: http://www.icann.org/biog/diop.htm.

*Media Contacts: *

Jason Keenan Media Adviser, ICANN (USA) Ph: +1 310 382 4004 E: jason.keenan@icann.org

Mouhamet Diop Chairman & CEO Kheweul.Com SENEGAL Ph: +221 821 29 39 Cell: +221 638 42 88 E: mouhamet.diop@kheweul.com

International: Andrew Robertson Edelman (London) Ph: +44 7921 588 770 E: andrew.robertson@edelman.com

...

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