Dear Angela, Mavic and all Asian CSO colleagues in Paris
Congratulations on your intervention in the plenary; it reconfirms Asian CSOs
leadership role in the WSIS process...bravo to all who made it happen (and who
drafted the statement in so little time)...
The issues you emphasized are strategic and non-negotiable. I am sure you have
the implicit support of people on this list...
It seems that aside from organizing ourselves (not that easy because of our
diversity), CSOs really has to be vigilant about interventions of government
which represent backward steps to the gains already made. We know all of you
will be actively guarding against this...
In all of this, let us all be reminded of the fact that WSIS formal process
such are these are just one of many arenas of struggle where we can make a
difference. Your engagement there is testament to our willingness to engage
this arena, but of course in then end, there are other arenas if that one is
not as "friendly"...
If you guys don't meet regularly, I suggest you schedule an informal fellowship
at least! Have a drink together and try to squeeze some time to enjoy Paris a
bit. We will all be with you in spirit! :-) Do find time to relax...(just a
bit :-)
Our prayers are with you...
Al
P.S. Angela, please give my regards to all APC colleagues present, as well as
to the CRIS people...
P.S. Chat, can you find out who is sitting in the Philippine panel (Geneva
mission? Embassy in Paris?). I know no one from our govt was able to go. If you
hava a chance, pls ask what happened to the Philippine govt comments to the
Drafts--there is a fear here that it was never submitted because of comments
from the Mission in Geneva, objecting to certain things (human rights
references?!?)... Am in touch with Heceta, Sarmiento and Pena here this week...
Quoting amkt@gn.apc.org:
> Hi Al,
>
> The Asia Pacific caucus did make an intervention during plenary on the first
>
> day, as we felt that as a region we could support the Civil Society
> Priorities
> Document and also to re-emphasise certain key principles i.e. principle of
> inclusivity (there was an attempt by the Czech government to incorporate in
> the
> Declaration the concept of national sovereignty and we wanted to emphasise
> that
> this should be extended to mean the sovereignty of the people), right to
> information and gender equality. Mavic from Isis presented on the Caucus'
> behalf, and she will be sending the statement we made to the list.
>
> Governments are reviewing the Declaration of Principles and among the
> controversial issues are concepts of "the right to information", "the right
> to
> communicate", "the right to development", and the concept of "knowledge
> society" vs. "information society". It was decided that there would be a
> working group to work out these concepts and come to a concensus on these.
>
> In response to this, the Content and Themes working group now led by Karen
> Banks (as Sally and Bill are not physically here) managed to have a concensus
>
> at plenary for caucuses who have asked to speak today (Day 2) to cover
> certain
> key principles that remain contentious or are missing. Interventions today
> included the importance of human rights (including Article 19), the
> importance
> of open source/free software (and under this the importance of not having
> Intellectual Property Rights regimes), Internet Governance, gender (by the
> Multistakeholder Gender Caucus), labour rights and press freedom/freedom of
> expression.
>
> There have been some calls from certain governments (including the European
> Union) to strike out all reference to women and youth from the Declaration.
> Fortunately, a number of governments are against but we have yet to see how
> the
> deliberations will go.
>
> The Asia Pacific Caucus does not meet daily, but we are in contact with each
>
> other. All of us stay at the same hotel so that facilitates things a lot for
> us.
>
> Warm regards,
>
> Angela
>
>
>
>
>
> Surlignage "Alan G. Alegre" <alalegre@fma.ph>:
>
> > FYI - a provisional agenda for the civil society plenary in Paris for the
> > intersessionals of WSIS.
> >
> > WE hope that our colleagues there keep us up to date... Godspeed in
> Paris...
> >
> > Al
> >
> >
> > ----- Original Message -----
> > From: ValñÓie Peugeot <vpeugeot@vecam.org>
> > To: <plenary@wsis-cs.org>; <ct@wsis-cs.org>
> > Sent: Tuesday, July 15, 2003 11:39 PM
> > Subject: [WSIS CS-Plenary] agenda for today meeting 18 : 00
> >
> >
> >
> > Civil society
> > Content and themes meeting
> > 15 07 2003.
> > 18 : 00
> >
> >
> > Agenda
> >
> >
> > Agenda adjustments.
> >
> > A - Plenary issues
> >
> > 1 Daily meetings for civil society :
> > - 9 h/ 10 h : Civil society Plenary. Room 2.
> > - 14 h/ 15 h 30 : Civil society Bureau (closed meeting). Room 14, Bonvin
> > building.
> > - 14 h/ 15 h 30 : Civil society drafting group. Room A 12
> > - 18 h/19 h : Working group on content and themes. Room 4.
> >
> > 2 General presentation of the process during the Inter session.
> > => monitoring team on controversial issues
> >
> >
> > B - Content and themes issues
> >
> >
> > 1 Update on the civil society priorities issues text : purpose, status,
> > elaboration process.
> > . report from Sally Burch and Bill Mciver
> > . additional amendments
> >
> > 2 Speaking slots for civil society in the following days : 4 * 3 =12
> > - any intervention required : send a typed and printed speech to Karen for
> > photocpoying + electronic copy to castrojl@ties.itu.int (Jean Louis
> Castro).
> > - Criteria for interventions : reflect the work of a caucus or a working
> > group (no individual speeches) + justify the need to take the floor on a
> > specific day + controversial issues.
> >
> > 3 Next step : action plan to be amended
> > . volunteers from each caucus and working group.
> >
> > 4 Press release
> >
> > 5 - Identification of governments delegates that we can target :
> > distribution of tasks between caucuses.
> >
> > 6 Other issues
> >
> > _______________________________________________
> > Plenary mailing list
> > Plenary@wsis-cs.org
> > http://mailman.greennet.org.uk/mailman/listinfo/plenary
> >
> >
> >
> >
>
>
>
>
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