If one looks at history, one finds many examples of international cooperation, mostly aimed at citizens to communicate or travel to other countries. They all seemed as big problems, but solutions were found. I gave a short list in another email, but perhaps some more detail will help. Air traffic control is important because without it (and sometimes even with it) airplanes and helicopters crash and people die. It is an expensive business to build airports, run air traffic control and all the other related activities. There are all sorts of rules for flying an airplane, but the important ones are things like all pilots and air traffic controllers (ATC) speak English as a common language. It may get me called a jingoist, but the reason for it is any pilot can talk to any ATC, anywhere. Without this international agreement, you would not be able to fly around the world. It does not stop some pilot in country YY from speaking the language of YY when flying in country YY to an ATC of YY. They can still communicate - which is the point. There are numerous other examples of agreements. It is my opinion that we can get agreements for ccTLDs, if we have a similar attitude. It is a problem which ICANN can play a role, such as establishing a minimum set of rules which all countries need to adopt to participate in the Internet for the same reason as done in air traffic. To some degree this has been done, especially in the technical arena, because it will not work otherwise. The ICANN role is setting the rules/procedures, but not interfering in local internal politics. Separating out these issues should help. --bob