High Level Asia-Pacific Conference for the World Summit on the Information Society, Tehran, Islamic Republic of Iran, 31 May – 2 June 2005

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The conference is jointly organized by the Government of the Islamic Republic of Iran, APDIP, UN Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific, International Telecommunication Union’s regional office for Asia and the Pacific, and other partners.

The High Level Asia-Pacific Conference for the World Summit on the Information Society takes place in Tehran from 31 May to 2 June 2005. The conference is jointly organized by the Government of the Islamic Republic of Iran, APDIP, UN Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific, International Telecommunication Union’s regional office for Asia and the Pacific, and other partners.

The Conference is expected to adopt the Tehran Declaration on Building the Information Society in Asia and the Pacific and the Regional Action Plan towards the Information Society for Asia and the Pacific and discuss follow up and implementation strategies / activities.

The Conference will discuss progress made in between the first and second phases of the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS), including the issues of Internet governance and financial mechanisms for ICT for development. It will also deliberate on the use of ICTs for knowledge-based disaster management with a view to formulate a regional framework for disaster management. The outcomes of the Conference will be presented to the WSIS PrepCom 3 in Geneva in September 2005

A paper entitled: “Voices from Asia-Pacific: Internet Governance Priorities and Recommendations,” has been developed for the Conference. This paper captures the results of the Open Regional Dialogue on Internet Governance (ORDIG) – an APDIP initiative created to understand governance priorities in the Asia-Pacific region, and provide Asia-Pacific perspectives to the United Nations Working Group on Internet Governance (UN_WGIG) and the WSIS. This paper documents findings from an extensive regional survey, an online discussion forum and a wide range of other research activities. It also contains an extensive discussion of Asian views and opinions on Internet Governance. As a supplement to this paper, a policy brief and executive summary has been developed.