U.S. Won’t Sign Revised ITRs Adopted at WCIT

The U.S. will not sign on to the revised International Telecommunication Regulations (ITRs) adopted at Thursday’s session of the World Conference on International Telecommunications (WCIT), said U.S. delegation head Terry Kramer Thursday. Delegations from Canada, the Czech Republic, Denmark and the United Kingdom also immediately said their nations would not sign the treaty-level document. Delegations from Costa Rica, Kenya, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Qatar, Sweden and Poland also expressed concerns about the revised ITRs, but wanted to consult with their national governments before deciding whether to sign. Egypt’s delegation also said it was concerned about the revised ITRs, but its position on signing the document was not immediately clear from its statement following the document’s adoption. Nations that already support the amended ITRs are expected to sign the treaty Friday in Dubai. The amended treaty will take effect Jan. 1, 2015.

"The Internet has given the world unimaginable economic and social benefits during these past 24 years, all without U.N. regulation,” Kramer said during Thursday’s session. “We candidly cannot support an ITU treaty that is inconsistent with the multistakeholder model of Internet governance. As the ITU has stated, this conference was never meant to focus on Internet issues. However, today, we're in a situation where we still have text and resolutions that cover issues on spam and also provisions on Internet governance. These past two weeks of course we have made good progress and shown a willingness to negotiate on a variety of telecommunications policy issue, such as roaming, and settlement rates. But the [U.S.] continues to believe that Internet policy must be multistakeholder driven."

Internet policy should not be determined by member states, Kramer said. “And such consultation from the private sector and civil society is paramount,” he said. “This has not happened here. We live in an interconnected world, which is becoming more interconnected with every passing day. We came to this conference with a hope for finding ways to advance our cooperation in the telecommunications arena, and continue to believe that is an important goal. We are disappointed that this conference didn’t fully provide that opportunity.” The U.S. fully intends to continue participating in the ITU and in ongoing discussions over international telecom, Kramer said.

FCC Commissioner Robert McDowell, who spent a week at the WCIT, said the latest developments are bad news on many fronts. “By agreeing to broaden the scope of the ITU’s rules to include the Internet, encompassing its operations and content, these nations have radically undermined the highly successful, private sector, non-governmental, multi-stakeholder model of Internet governance,” McDowell said in a statement. “Even though the United States refused to sign the new agreement, what happened today in Dubai could have ripple effects here at home. Consumers everywhere will ultimately pay the price for this power grab as engineers and entrepreneurs try to navigate this new era of an internationally politicized Internet. If this assault on Internet freedom continues unabated, consumers’ prices will rise while investment and innovation will stall."

McDowell told us, “Consumers may not feel an effect from this action tomorrow or even next month, but the long-term, slow incremental trajectory of this unprecedented action will ultimately create market uncertainty and therefore higher prices and fewer products and services for consumers,” he said. McDowell said he started to focus on WCIT last November: “I spent most of the first half of last year trying to raise awareness of this issue and the second half trying to recruit international allies, so naturally I'm disappointed. I'm very disappointed in the outcome. The significance of the ITU’s action is that it starts the twisting of a one-way ratchet towards more Internet regulation."

House Commerce Committee Republicans, led by Chairman Fred Upton (Mich.) said Kramer and the U.S. delegation “should be commended for their principled stance on behalf of Internet users around the globe” and were right to walk away from a treaty.

Multiple provisions within the “near-final” draft of the revised ITRs prompted the U.S. to withdraw from the treaty, Kramer told reporters in a press conference shortly after the ITRs were adopted. Among them was the inclusion of an additional paragraph in the document’s preamble that said the ITRs “recognize the right of access of Member States to international telecommunication services.” Debate over inclusion of the paragraph, originally proposed by Nigeria’s delegation but later also supported by others, immediately preceded adoption of the ITRs. Many African nations, several from the Middle East, as well as China, Indonesia and the Russian Federation, voiced support for the resolution. The U.S., Canada and several nations in Western Europe voiced opposition. “I believe we could not accept that,” said Dick Beaird, vice chair of the U.S. delegation, during the debate. “Human rights obligations go to the individual” rather than national governments. Although conference Chairman Mohamed Nasser Al Ghanim initially declared the resolution had failed because there was not consensus support, Iran called for a vote. Ultimately, 77 delegations voted in favor, and 33 voted against; eight delegations abstained.

Other objectionable provisions included language in Article 1 that extended the scope of the ITRs beyond the “recognized” operating agencies that the original ITRs applied to, Kramer said. The U.S. also objected to the inclusion of Articles 5A and 5B in the final draft, Kramer said. Article 5A deals with network security, saying member states “shall individually and collectively endeavour” to ensure security on international telecom networks. Article 5B deals with spam, saying member states “should endeavour to take necessary measures” to prevent spam.

Some of the most controversial proposals on Internet governance did not make it into the final draft, including the Russian Federation’s article on Internet governance, which the U.S. and its allies had vigorously opposed (CD Nov 30 p9). Article 6, which deals with charging and accounting, did not include “sender party pays” language originally proposed by the European Telecommunications Network Operators’ Association and later taken up by a group of delegations from Africa and the Middle East. The U.S. also opposed the proposal (CD Nov 15 p11).

However, the “near-final” ITRs document did include a resolution -- which was not legally binding to the document but still attached -- “to foster an enabling environment for the greater growth of the Internet.” The resolution addressed some Internet and broadband issues, including that “all governments should have an equal role and responsibility for international Internet governance and for ensuring the stability, security and continuity of the existing Internet.” The resolution sparked a round of heated debate during Wednesday’s session that ended early Thursday, with Al Ghanim declaring the resolution passed because a majority of delegations had indicated interest through a poll, rather than an actual vote (CD Dec 12 p1). Al Ghanim’s action may have done more harm than good, Kieren McCarthy, CEO OF Internet information policy service .Nxt, told us. “It was an effort to make progress before they wrapped up but it backfired spectacularly,” he said. “Tenuous sense of trust in the chair was lost."

Internet Society President Lynn St. Amour opposed the resolution soon after it passed Wednesday Washington time. “The Internet Society is concerned about the direction that the ITRs are taking with regards to the Internet,” St. Amour said. “Contrary to assurances that this treaty is not about the Internet, the conference appears to have adopted, by majority, a resolution on the Internet. … This is clearly a disappointing development and we hope that tomorrow brings an opportunity for reconsideration of this approach."

Computer & Communications Industry Association President Ed Black took issue with Al Ghanim’s decision to declare the resolution adopted based on majority support. “It contradicts the words of the ITU Secretary General Hamadoun Touré, who for months insisted that the WCIT would under no circumstances address Internet concerns -- and that all decisions would be made by consensus, not voting,” Black said Thursday in a statement.

TechAmerica President Shawn Osborne also voiced his opposition to the resolution Thursday. “The decisions that have taken place in Dubai have the potential to take us down a path towards state-led regulation of the Internet. If the future governance of the Internet were in the hands of a statutory international body, there is no doubt that more autocratic countries would attempt to undermine the multiple underpinnings that ensure Internet freedom."

The U.S. did not decide not to sign because of any one particular provision, Kramer said. The overall tenor of the revised ITRs extended its reach into the Internet arena in a way the U.S. objected to, rather than conforming to the U.S. goal for a document largely similar in tenor to the original ITRs adopted in 1988, he said. “Each of those would have been a big issue,” Kramer said. While the revised ITRs were not completely finalized Thursday, they were at such an advanced stage of negotiation that fundamental changes that would cause the U.S. to sign onto the ITRs were not likely, he said.

While the U.S. will not sign the revised ITRs, Kramer said he does not consider WCIT a failure. “It is so easy in this setting to lose sight of the plot,” he said. WCIT was a chance for the U.S. to communicate its vision for success in the telecom and Internet sectors, Kramer said.