FCC Wants U.S. to Improve Image on Telecom Issues Ahead of Post-WCIT International Conferences

The U.S. needs to start resurrecting its image as a “great actor” in international telecommunications and highlight its good works on issues like cybersecurity, as it gears up for conferences after the World Conference on International Telecommunications (WCIT), said Roxanne McElvane, senior counselor on International Development in the FCC’s International Bureau and the chair of the ITU’s Development Sector Study Group 1, at an International Telecommunication Advisory Committee (ITAC) meeting Tuesday to prepare the U.S. for the upcoming World Telecommunication Development Conference (WTDC). The WTDC, scheduled for March 31-April 11, 2014, in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt, is one of several ITU-led conferences scheduled for this year and next that will determine the future structure and policy actions of the ITU. The U.S. was one of 55 nations that did not sign onto a revised version of the International Telecommunication Regulations (ITRs) at WCIT; 89 nations signed the revised ITRs (CD Dec 17 p1).

The U.S.’s opposition to various proposals at WCIT overshadowed its good works “to many of the people in the room,” particularly developing nations, McElvane said. “We have to start, in a number of different ways, telling a different story about who we are,” she said. “I think that there’s a very reasonable explanation for the things that occurred at WCIT, but I don’t think that’s the impression that other people have."

Some of that outreach work can occur at the ITU-hosted WTDC, which sets the agenda and guidelines for the ITU’s Development Sector for the following four years, McElvane said. Other ITU-led conferences set for this year and next include the World Telecommunication Policy Forum (WTPF), which will be May 14-16 in Geneva, and the ITU Plenipotentiary Conference, Oct. 20-Nov. 7, 2014, in Busan, South Korea.

The ITAC ad-hoc group has just begun preparing for the WTDC -- Tuesday’s meeting was its first to focus on the conference. The group plans to hold additional meetings through the end of April as it works to craft U.S. proposals for the conference ahead of a submission deadline this summer. Preparatory work ahead of the WTDC will naturally also transition into preparatory work for the ITU Plenipotentiary, said Cecily Holiday, director of State’s International Telecommunications Advisory Committee.

The U.S. is also continuing planning ahead of the WTPF. Initial ITU-led preparatory meetings in advance of WTPF indicate ITU Secretary-General Hamadoun Touré wants that conference to move away from the controversial issues that made WCIT a lightning rod for criticism and international attention, said Paul Najarian, State’s Foreign Affairs Officer-Telecom. WTPF is a non-binding conference, and there is an emphasis on issues on which all parties can reach an easy consensus, he said. An attempt to include human rights on the agenda for WTPF -- one of the issues that caused controversy at WCIT -- was tabled, Najarian said. Only one proposal currently being considered for inclusion at the conference, on enhanced cooperation, is likely to be problematic from a U.S. perspective, he said.