Arab Telecommunications and Information Council of Ministers Welcomes Egyptian Project on Youth Safety Online.

Date: May 26th, 2009

A high-level Egyptian delegation took part in the thirteenth ordinary round of Arab Telecommunications and Information Council of Ministers was held form 26th to 28th of May, 2009 in Lebanese capital Beirut.

The delegation was led by Dr. Ahmed El-Sherbini, Deputy Minister of Communications and Information Technology for International Cooperation and Director of National Telecommunication Institute (NTI).

Egyptian National Post Organization (ENPO) Deputy Chairman, Senior Officials from Ministry of Communications and Information Technology (MCIT) and representatives of National Telecommunication Regulatory Authority (NTRA) were among the delegation members.

The delegation presented a project about protecting Arab youth on the web, which was welcomed by the council. The council also agreed to enlist it among the Arab strategic communication and IT projects.

The meeting agenda consisted of several key issues like: following up the taskforce formulating the Arab strategy, tariffs and traffic among Arab countries, domain names and other internet related issues and transferring from IP version 4 to IP version 6.

The agenda also included the output of the permanent post committee and a follow up on decisions of the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) about offering support to Iraq and Palestine.

Meanwhile, the Egyptian delegation invited the Arab ministers and delegations to the fourth Internet Governance Forum (IGF) due to be held in Sharm El-Sheikh resort in November 2009. The event, to be held for the first time in an Arab country, aims at intensifying the Arab presence in the forum.

Separately, Arab Telecommunications and Information Council of Ministers assigned the general secretariat of the Arab League to coordinate with Egypt the preparation of a study on the future of information and communication technology (ICT) in the Arab World. The study will be presented in the economic summit due in Egypt in 2011.