<html><head><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html charset=utf-8"></head><body style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space;" class="">*** Note the March 15 hard deadline for nominations. ***<br class=""><br class="">Dear all<br class=""><br class="">As many of you are aware, the outcome document of the 2005 World<br class="">Summit on the Information Society in Tunis [1, para 69] contains a<br class="">call for "enhanced cooperation in the future, to enable governments,<br class="">on an equal footing, to carry out their roles and responsibilities,<br class="">in international public policy issues pertaining to the Internet,<br class="">but not in the day-to-day technical and operational matters, that do<br class="">not impact on international public policy issues."<br class="">[1] <a href="http://www.itu.int/net/wsis/docs2/tunis/off/6rev1.html" class="">http://www.itu.int/net/wsis/docs2/tunis/off/6rev1.html</a><br class=""><br class="">So far there has been little to no agreement on how this should be<br class="">implemented.<br class=""><br class="">Now the UN General Assembly has asked the Chair of the Commission on<br class="">Science and Technology for Development (CSTD) to "establish a<br class="">working group to develop recommendations on how to further implement<br class="">enhanced cooperation as envisioned in the Tunis Agenda." This will<br class="">continue work done by an earlier CSTD Working Group on Enhanced<br class="">Cooperation, that was active from 2013-2014.<br class=""><br class="">There will be five Civil Society representatives on this Working<br class="">Group, one from each UN region. These civil society representatives<br class="">will be selected by the Civil Society Coordination Group (CSCG), see<br class="">below for further information. I'm sure that before long CSCG will<br class="">publish an official announcement detailing selection criteria, but<br class="">since time is short, here is the information which is available<br class="">already:<br class=""><br class="">The Civil Society Coordination Group requests that Civil Society<br class="">communities and individuals submit names of candidates from<br class="">developed and developing countries as well as from economies in<br class="">transition, all geographic areas, and policy orientations to serve<br class="">as Civil Society representatives on the CSTD Working Group on<br class="">Enhanced Cooperation, the announcement for which can be found at<br class=""><a href="http://unctad.org/en/pages/newsdetails.aspx?OriginalVersionID=1193" class="">http://unctad.org/en/pages/newsdetails.aspx?OriginalVersionID=1193</a>.<br class="">More information about the WG proposal can be found at<br class=""><a href="http://unctad.org/meetings/en/Presentation/CSTD_2015_s11_Major_en.pdf" class="">http://unctad.org/meetings/en/Presentation/CSTD_2015_s11_Major_en.pdf</a> .<br class="">While the exact timeframe for the working group has not been<br class="">established, nominees are asked to consider a service period of<br class="">2016-2017 (and eventually the beginning of 2018).<br class=""><br class="">Shortlists should be submitted to the CSCG’s nominations committee<br class="">(nomcom) via the email address nomcom06 [at] internetgov-cs [dot] org<br class="">no later than 15 March 2016. Independent Civil Society experts (i.e.<br class="">those who are not nominated by a civil society network or other<br class="">community) are welcome to send self-nominations directly to the CSCG<br class="">nomcom by the same deadline. <br class=""><br class="">Nominations should include a short bio of one paragraph, one<br class="">paragraph of motivation to be a civil society representative to the<br class="">WG, one paragraph describing substantive proposals or a vision on<br class="">"how to further implement enhanced cooperation as envisioned in the<br class="">Tunis Agenda", and one paragraph describing experience or<br class="">qualifications to represent civil society on the WG. Name, gender,<br class="">regional/geographical, as well as any appropriate affiliation<br class="">information and contact information should be included as well.<br class=""><br class="">Proficiency in English is necessary for communications within the<br class="">Working Group.<br class=""><br class=""><br class="">About CSCG and the current nomcom:<br class=""><br class="">The Civil Society Coordination Group (CSCG) has been established to<br class="">ensure a coordinated civil society response and conduit when it comes<br class="">to making civil society appointments to outside bodies. It comprises<br class="">representatives of the coalition members of the Best Bits,<br class="">Association for Progressive Communications (APC), Internet Governance<br class="">Caucus (IGC), Just Net Coalition (JNC), and the Non-Commercial<br class="">Stakeholders Group of ICANN. <br class=""><br class="">As per the CSCG's procedures [2], for any selection task, the CSCG<br class="">will determine selection criteria and announce them as part of a call<br class="">for candidates, which is then circulated as broadly as possible<br class="">across many different constituencies. All members of the CSCG<br class="">nomination committee are required to consider the interests of civil<br class="">society as a whole, and not just their own coalition, in determining<br class="">appropriate representatives. The nomination committee will take into<br class="">account geographic and gender balance in determining their final<br class="">selections, while considering also the need for the breadth of<br class="">viewpoints/worldviews represented within civil society to be<br class="">represented.<br class="">[2] <a href="http://internetgov-cs.org/procedures" class="">http://internetgov-cs.org/procedures</a><br class=""><br class=""><br class="">Peter Major, the Chair of the CSCG, has appointed CSCG as the "focal<br class="">point" for appointments of Civil Society representatives on this<br class="">Working Group, and CSCG has correspondingly established a nomcom for<br class="">this selection task.<br class=""><br class="">Please feel free to contact us if you need further information or to<br class="">discuss how we can work together to ensure our mutual objective to<br class="">ensure the best possible civil society representation on this<br class="">Working Group. Members of the civil society networks which are<br class="">directly represented on the nomcom are requested to address such<br class="">communications to the representative of the corresponding network,<br class="">while the co-chairs of CSCG, Ginger Paque and Ian Peter, are<br class="">available for inquiries from others. <br class=""><br class="">The members of the CSCG nomcom for the CSTD WG on Enhanced<br class="">Cooperation are:<br class=""><br class="">Deirdre Williams, representative of the Civil Society Internet<br class="">Governance Caucus (IGC), and recent Co-Coordinator of the IGC<br class=""><br class="">Chat Garcia Ramilo, representative of the Association for<br class="">Progressive Communications (APC), and Deputy Executive Director of APC<br class=""><br class="">Ginger (Virginia) Paque, non-voting Co-Chair of CSCG, and with Diplo<br class="">Foundation, Internet Governance Programmes<br class="">(contact: virginiap at diplomacy dot edu)<br class=""><br class="">Ian Peter, non-voting Co-Chair of CSCG, independent<br class="">(contact: ian dot peter at ianpeter dot com)<br class=""><br class="">Nadira Alaraj, representative of Best Bits<br class=""><br class="">Norbert Bollow, representative of the Just Net Coalition (JNC), and<br class="">Co-Convenor of JNC<br class=""><br class="">Robin Gross, representative of the Non-Commercial Stakeholders Group<br class="">(NCSG), and member of the NCSG Executive Committee</body></html>