January - March 2019

Updates

1. ICANN Board approves delegation of 2 new Top Level Domains (TLDs):  Internationalized Domain Name (IDN) موريتانيا for Mauritania and .SS for South Sudan
2. 2019 ICANN Nominating Committee inviting applications and recommendations for:  members of the ICANN Board of Directors, one member of the PTI Board of Directors, three regional representatives to the At-Large Advisory Committee (ALAC), two members of the Generic Name Supporting Organization (GNSO) Council, one member of the Country Code Names Supporting Organization (ccNSO) Council. Deadline extended from 08 Mar 2019 to 22 Mar 2019.
3. AFRALO Policy Hot Topics documents published. Hot Topics document available for download here.
4. Community Regional Outreach Program (CROP): Abdulkarim Oleyede attended the African Network Information Center (AFRINIC) 29 meeting in Hammamet, Tunisia between 27 - 30 November 2018. Participation report available here.
5. Additional Budget Request (ABR) proposals for FY20: Funding approved for DigitalSENSE (contact: Remmy Nweke) for $500 for printing of the AFRALO flyer in English and a local Nigerian language for event in June 2019. Total funds remaining for AFRALO: $1,000. Reminder: Send reports for funded events to AFRALO/ICANN At-Large Staff.

Recent and upcoming AFRALO Activities

ICANN64 - Kobe, Japan

• Joint AFRALO-AfrICANN meeting
• Outreach and Engagement session with Global Stakeholder Engagement (GSE) team

ICANN NOMCOM Update

By: Aziz Hilali, ALAC AFRALO delegate to the NOMCOM

ICANN 64 in Kobe, Japan provided the NomCom team with the opportunity for the final push for outreach before the application deadline for ICANN open seats. Outreach activities included amongst many other activities: Meetings with the various ICANN constituencies; Video by the NomCom Chair, Damon Ashcraft, (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XR6pvEisoxw); a presentation at the APAC Space session and casual outreach during the different community social events.

At the close of the application period, on March 22, 2019, the NomCom had received a total of 128 completed applications distributed as follows:

EPDP on the Temporary Specification for gTLD Registration Data ICANN 64 F2F Meetings

By Hadia Elminiawi AFRALO – ALAC member     

The EPDP team on gTLD Registration Data had 3 F2F meetings and an informal reception during the ICANN 64 meeting in Kobe. The first meeting was a full day that concluded at 18:30 local time. The meeting began with a "Tour de Table", wherein each stakeholder made an opening statement. I presented the ALAC statement, which addressed our commitments, objectives and expectations for phase 2. Next we discussed the mind map of phase 2. The mind map includes three main strands, the first is the System for Standardized Access to Non-Public Registration Data which includes three main topics: a) Purposes for accessing data, b) Credentialing and c) Terms of access and compliance. The second strand is about Important Issues for Further Community Action which includes topics like natural and legal persons and the third strand is about Issues Deferred from EPDP Phase 1.  The mind map includes the charter questions and topics in addition to the items that were deferred from phase 1. Next we went through a brain storming exercise with the objective of identifying interdependencies among the issues and creating an order for discussions, in addition to identifying the resource requirements and the working methods. After that we discussed possible approaches, timelines, working methods and a possible target date for the delivery of the report. Lastly we had an implementation status update by the GDD. The second F2F meeting was with the Technical Study Group (TSG) on Access to Non-Public Registration Data, the TSG presented an overview of the draft technical model, draft design schematic, the timelines and plans. The target date for the publishing of the Final Technical Model is the 23^rd of April 2019. On the third F2F meeting we agreed that the team will review the mind map and follow up on the questions that relate to the dependencies, priorities, legal guidance and the target date for the publishing of the report, we also agreed that several google docs will be set to identify potential legal questions and any additional required questions that need to be addressed, in addition a question was posed to ICANN org with regard to sharing the TGS report with the EPDP/DPAs.

ICANN 64 Middle East Space Session

The Middle East Space had a session during the ICANN 64 meeting in Kobe, which I participated in. Cherine Chalaby ICANN Board Chairperson, Ajay Data UASG Chairperson and Ram Mohan former UASG Chairperson attended the session. Present at the session were also some members of the UASG , TF-AIDN and the Middle East Space leaders in addition to some members of the Middle East community and the wider ICANN community. During the session we discussed the charter of the Middle East Space, we agreed that some edits were required and that a final version will be circulated to the community for final approval. After that the Middle East Space Statement was presented and discussed. The statement addressed the topic of UA, highlighting its importance to the region. It included recommendations to ICANN to help support the UA community initiative and said that the suggested recommendations contribute to strategic goal 3.1 of the ICANN 2021-2025 strategic plan. We agreed that a concise version of the statement would be prepared and read during the public forum and that the statement would be finalized later by the drafting team and the community based on the session’s discussion. The Middle East Statement on UA was read during the public forum by Zakir Syed.

Applications

At-Large Structures

None in the first quarter of 2019

Individual Members

Monthly Meeting details

Please see Agenda, Transcripts and Action Items for January 2019 and February 2019 meetings. The March monthly call was cancelled due to travel for ICANN64 in Kobe, Japan.

(French translation to be provided soon)