Split over internet averted

2005-11-16 08:48

Tunis - Negotiators on Tuesday avoided a potentially damaging split between the United States and the rest of the world over control of the internet, saying they had agreed to work towards enhanced international co-operation.

Diplomats said a working group reached an agreement on key clauses on internet governance for endorsement at the World Summit on the Internet Society beginning in Tunis on Wednesday.

A three-year deadlock in preliminary talks until the late hours of Tuesday had revolved around Washington's single-handed oversight of the private body that oversees the technical and administrative roots of the global network

The agreement set up two parallel tracks of talks, one an open-ended process "towards enhanced co-operation" by "relevant international organisations" on public policy issues, to be triggered by United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan early next year, according to the final draft.

The other creates an Intergovernmental Forum (IGF) to hold talks on all internet issues, including problems such as spam, cyber crime or computer viruses.

Internet agreement

Officials said the private non-profit Internet Corporation For Assigned Names and Numbers (Icann) was likely to exist even with its tender due for renewal by the US government next summer, since nothing in the final draft ruled it out.

"We did not change anything on the role of the US government with regard to the technical aspects that we were very concerned about," top US negotiator David Gross said after the agreement struck between 170 countries.

"We saw the world's countries recognising how very important the internet is and how important the growth of the internet is, and no one created a problem that could help retard that growth," Gross, the US co-ordinator for international communications and information policy, added.

Countries such as Iran and China had sought UN oversight of Icann or the internet governance, but the US firmly objected.

Split can damage internet

The agreement reached in the preparatory talks loosely followed a middle-of-the road formula proposed this week by the European Union (EU).

"The worst has been avoided but we're not sure that the best is to come in the future. We have left a door open," a member of the French delegation, Bernard Benhamou, said.

Officials warned that an ongoing split could have prompted the emergence of competing networks and torn apart the internet.

Public policy issues include internet resources, security of the network, and development issues, as well as Icann's role in allocating domain names and addresses.

Washington's critics had warned that no single nation could maintain control over top level domain or country names without the threat of it being misused.

The number of users of the worldwide web has grown from 106 million to more than one billion under the current seven year-old governance structure, the International Chamber of Commerce said.

- AFP