Meeting of the NRO Executive Council – 050721

Participants
Axel Pawlik (AP) (Chair) – RIPE NCC
Ray Plzak (RP) – ARIN)
Adiel Akplogan (AA) – AFRINIC
Raul Echeberria (RE) – LACNIC
Paul Wilson (PW) – APNIC

Observer and note taker German Valdez (GV) – LACNIC

At 11:15 UTC the Chair convened the meeting.

AGENDA

1. Agenda bashing
2. Last meeting’s minutes
3. Next meeting date
4. Status open actions
5. IANA Service Contract
6. ICANN contract framework
7. “Address registry failover”, Axel
8. “The new ICANN policy person”, Ray
9. Relationship with ASO AC, Ray
10. Geneva Meeting Report
11. ICANN BAG report and strategy
12. APNIC liaison proposal
13. PrepCom Geneva timesharing
14. PrepCom Geneva Roundtable
15. WSIS summit participation
16. WSIS summit ISOC pavilion
17. AFRINIC Space
18. AOB

1) Agenda bashing

2) Last meeting’s minutes

Minutes were approved

RE confirm and support all pending motions.

3) Next meeting date

Next meeting has been scheduled for August 9th,2005 at 1100 UTC

4) Status open actions

RE proceeded to read all Open Actions and modified their status as is attached at the end of this minute

5) IANA Service Contract and 6) ICANN contract framework

AP: Ray will provide us the document this week or early next week.

RP: Take care of potential conflict of interest for those ICANN Board and RIR Board Members. We should review this.

PW: I can raise it as an issue of concern with the APNIC EC.

RE: I think that on one hand this situation is bad for us because there are people on the ICANN board who will have to abstain from voting on some issues because of their conflict of interests and we would like to have all our people supporting our position on the ICANN board, but on the other hand I’m not unhappy about having RIR board members on the ICANN board.

RP: They not only have to abstain from voting, they have to be completely removed from all discussions.

RE: So far this hasn’t happened, nobody’s been removed from the room or conference. But I can see that this is a concern and surely PW will take it to his EC.

RP: We have policies in place which preclude members of our Board or members of our Advisory Council or members from our region who are on the AC from being involved in these other boards and we will not even entertain the candidacy of someone who is not willing to resign from one position in order to be elected to the other.

RE: We should talk more about matter so we can have a common position.

PW: I would appreciate something formal from the NRO EC asking me to review this in APNIC, and what specifically is being said: is it a question of discomfort; is it a question of how we handle conflicts of interests or what?

RP: I will bring this matter before the ARIN board at our next meeting (August 8) and see if they wish to make a formal statement, in which case I will provide it to you so you can take that to your EC.

RE: If we understand that this particular case constitutes a conflict interests, perhaps we should take a more general position regarding ICANN and the conflict of interests of other people too.

After further discussion the following actions were decided:

NRO EC 05-48 050721
RP to bring the matter before the ARIN board. If the they decide to make a formal statement, RP to provide the statement to PW who will take it to his EC.

NRO EC 05-49 050721
ALL: General discussion that has to result in a position statement from the NRO to the ICANN board in relation to these conflicts of interests; this statement must cover more than just the members from our particular interest group but also members from other interest groups.

7) “Address registry failover”, Axel

AP: This is something we have talked about before but in my opinion it has become more important that we have some mechanism for mitigating the fallout of a catastrophic RIR failure.

RP: I agree, but probably we first need examine and decide which the essential services are and how those services would continue.

AP: I’m thinking in terms that we can have all the important data from the RIRs in some encrypted. A very simple idea would be to encrypt everything and give the key, perhaps, to the chairman of our various boards, we dump the stuff regularly so that somebody somewhere still has the data.

RP: You’re talking about a backup and recovery and restore plan. I can have Richard work on this. We have a system for backing up our data, but if ARIN goes away how would someone else go and get that information.

RE: We need to have someone other than Engineers working on this, because we have to agree on many things. We need to have a high level plan.

After further discussion the following action was decided:

NRO EC 05-50 050721
RP. Coordinate with Richard and Federico to work on a backup and recovery plan to use in case of a catastrophic RIR failure.

8) New ICANN policy person

PW: Liz Williams, who used to work with Paul Twomey has been appointed to ICANN in a policy management position of some kind. I suggest. we can make a formal approach to the ICANN board

RP. Let’s wait until Vancouver meeting where several of us will be and see what happen with the New ICANN Policy Person.

9) Relationship with ASO AC, Ray

RP. Currently we are going through documents for comments we shouldn’t be colluding but collaborating, for example we may decide it’s important for both of us to comment on the same aspect of a document, or we may decide that ASO AC should comment on one aspect and the NRO EC on another, this way we could cross reference each other’s statements. We should do some kind of collaborative work in this sense, because in the end what we want is to have a unified voice (though not an identical voice) to comments on things that affect the addressing community. My proposal is that we need to work out some kind of low level procedure to see how this is done

NRO EC 05-51 050721
RP. To coordinate with ASO AC Chair a procedure for collaborative work between ASO AC and NRO and report back to the EC.

– ASO AC liaisons

RP: There is a proposal for the AC to establish liaisons; and there was a list provided in order to do policy consultations. I responded to this noted that it’s the NRO that will be entering into liaison, and also observed that before the AC considers recommending a liaison they should look into all the consequences of doing so. The ASO MoU says that liaisons will be established for matters of mutual benefit, but mutual benefit is going to be more than just policy consultation when you establish liaisons.

RE: I have two concerns: First, it should be very clear that those organizations would not have any rol in which it could say that the AC should review the process followed by the RIRs in terms of reaching a position of common agreement and a common take on the proposed global policy. My second concern is the AC has no role in the drafting of the policy at this stage.

RP: According to the MoU The AC cannot establish liaisons by themselves, only the NRO can do this. I pointed this out in my e-mail; they can only come to us with a recommendation.
RE: I believe the establishment of liaisons is one thing, and the proposal in relation to publishing a list of interested parties is another.

RP: This goes back to the issue I had about our relationship with the AC.

10) Geneva Meeting Report

AP: Basically we had a roundtable on who had what opinion on the WGIG report, the UN said that they would remain in this whole process. There was some discussion of leading principles and how they would hopefully spill over into the WSIS process. Other than that, it was basically the attempt try to get a feeling on what was everyone’s opinion on the report from a wider audience.

PW: Ambassador Khan said in Luxemburg that there would be open participation in the negotiations of the subcommittees, not necessarily as participants but as observers.

RE: How many governments participated in the meeting yesterday?

AP: Probably 50 percent of the people who were there, 50 or so.

RE: So it was not a successful meeting?

AP: I don’t know what the measure of the success of a meeting is. Perhaps they intended to keep it small, limit the number of participants.

After further discussion, at RE’s proposal, the following action was decided:

NRO EC 05-52 050721
AP To send a note to the ambassador Khan thanking him for the opportunity to participate in the meeting this week and saying one more time that the NRO is very interested in participating in everything and that we hope to work closely with him, etc.

AA: Raul, I would like to know what are your thoughts on what is the next step, about what will happen at WSIS or UN level regarding Internet Governance, what is your opinion?

RE: The WGIG has finished; the process of subcommittee negotiations and the PrepCom haven’t started. Then there will be negotiations led by the ambassador, he plans to draft the recommendations from the PrepCom. We’ll have to stay close to him and try to participate in as many meetings as possible. It’s difficult to make a prediction at this moment as to what will happen. Results depend on the US Government negotiations.

AA: In our region there is still a lot of excitement around this and around the last declaration of the US government and also the proposal of the WGIG, so it’s good to have an inside opinion. There is a meeting for African ICT ministers, and they have invited AFRINIC. Although the agenda is not clear yet, I think this issue will be on the table. As soon as I get the agenda I will provide it to you.

11) ICANN BAG report and strategy

RP: The BAG meeting in Luxemburg discussed primarily the existence of a budget advisory group. There was a statement by Paul Twomey that ICANN staff in particular wanted the BAG to be there but they wanted them to be more visible so that the BAG would take the heat for the ICANN budget and not ICANN itself. The only other thing that came out of there was in the end an issue raised by the GNSO people, about the amount of the contributions by the RIRs and the ccNSO. The time for the meeting ran out and we did not have that discussion. This triggered my subsequent proposal to actually come into some kind of a deterministic method and model of providing funds to ICANN that is more related to our ability to pay than to their ability to spend. I think I’ve already explained to everybody about this and documents should be forthcoming on that.

It was decided that no action was necessary in relation to the BAG report.

12) APNIC liaison proposal

AP: This was already discussed earlier. Paul, about the liaison proposal that you have sent to the EC list, would you like to expand on that?

PW: I don’t have much to add, I think the proposal is self-explanatory. I guess there was enough to discuss in Luxemburg last week, it seems to me that it’s not likely to go anywhere. I got the impression that it might be worth focusing on the IETF liaison, rewriting the proposal to include only the IETF liaison.

RP: I agreed I would submit both of these proposals (ITU and IETF) to the ARIN board for discussion and provide feedback.

PW: Would it be useful to have the proposal rewritten just to cover the IETF?

RP: No, I’ll bring them into two different agenda items, because it’s very clear there are two very different proposals inside one document.

13) PrepCom Geneva timesharing and 14) PrepCom Geneva Roundtable

AP: We have been invited by Markus to give a lunchtime presentation on numbers at the PrepCom, probably during the first Wednesday, who of you intends to go there and for how long? I will probably be there during the first week.

RP: I’ve yet to figure out what I’m going to do in regards of travel. I’m concerned about finding out as soon as possible the dates for the activities that we will are going to participate in. I’m really more interested in knowing when the open sessions of the subcommittees will be held.

RE: I don’t know yet when I will be in Geneva, I will participate in the PrepCom but not for the entire the two weeks.

At PW’s request, the following action was decided:

NRO EC 05-53 050721
AP To add to the thank you note to Ambassador Khan a request for a tentative schedule of the meetings of the subcommittees.

15) WSIS summit participation

AP: We have the question of participation in general, should we go or not.

RP: I think it’s a good idea for us to have a presence at the summit.

AP: I have booked five hotel rooms just in case you decide to go.

RP: I intend to be at the summit and I’m also going to be bringing my general counsel. We’re already working on the rooms, it’s best to work with Sam on this.

RE: I believe that the same will happen as with the first phase of the summit. My impression is that the issue of Internet Governance will finish being negotiated the day before the summit. Maybe we’ll have to be there the week before the summit.

RP: We need to know as soon as possible when we need to be there.

RP: Actually what’s going to be most interesting is not on the agenda; it’s the IANA contract between the Department of Commerce and ICANN which ends on March 31. They’re going to have to do something publicly about this contract within the October-November timeframe because there’s been changes in US government regulations regarding contracting.

– Publications:

PW: Someone is putting together an official WSIS publication that will profile the organizations that are involved with the WSIS process. I believe that the deal is that we can include about 1000 words of our own choosing. We have to buy a minimum of 100 copies, and they will actually mail them out to our own mailing. The cost is approximately US$ 10,000.

AP: My initial thinking was “Although I don’t know if we’ll be able to be there in person, buying a page in that publication will help.” I don’t know how many people are going to actually look at it but some might, so I believe it’s a good idea.

RP: I suggest that we should distribute the publication in a different way.

PW: Yes, for example have 20 copies sent to each RIR.

RE: What’s the deadline? What about the other contents of the publication? If we distribute those publications we will be not only distributing our contribution but also the other contributions. Do you know who will contribute and what they will be writing about?

PW: I believe the deadline is in August, it’s published in October. The other contributors and contents are not clear to me. I can ask this person about this.

RP: Yes, it would be nice to know who else is already signed up.

RE: It’s important because for example if we contribute two pages and other entities contribute twenty pages then it’s bad business for us.

RP: Also, it is possible that other contributors take a position contrary to us.

PW: On the other hand we would also be making our own position known and not letting others simply do whatever they want.

RP: But what we’ve been asked to provide is basically a profile of our organization.

NRO EC 05-54 050721
PW To find out about the deadline for presenting our contribution and about other contributions and contents.

16) WSIS summit ISOC pavillion

AP: We should talk about the possibility of sharing in a possible ISOC stand or pavilion. I thought that maybe we could prepare things so that we could speak about the work done in AFRINIC and developing countries and what the RIRs are doing for them. Try to tell a success story, but have somebody on the pavilion at all times.

RP: I agree that this would be a good story to have there, but we also have to be sure about how our material will be distributed. What we do need to have is a place at the summit and probably also at the PrepCom to distribute literature regarding what we do, who we are, etc.

AA: I think maybe the results will not be as big as we could imagine, but I think it would be a good thing, specially in Africa. I definitely support the idea of having RIR staff at the. Personally I believe that we should have something there, but we should make it clear that we are sharing the place and have one or two staff from the RIRs present there. It won’t harm us, and it will help our image.

NRO EC 05-55 050721
RP. To talk to Lynn and ask her about what the participation would entail and how we can participate in a meaningful manner.

AA: Can we involve the CCG in that as well?

All: Yes, definitely in the production of literature.

RP: We can also actually look at them for staffing, this is a good idea.

17) AFRINIC Space

AA: I am talking about IPv4 space which needs to be allocated to AFRINIC now by IANA, and the same needs to be done with the IPv6 which was reserved for AFRINIC or allocated to ARIN for Africa to use. I had a talk with Doug and Barbara in Luxemburg, according to them it shouldn’t be any problem reallocating this to AFRINIC. I don’t know if there is any action needed on the part of the NRO on this matter?

RP: I’ve already talked to them about this, but. I’ll start working on this. You’re talking about changes in the file notations, right? This is just an administrative issue, I’ll take care of it.

18) AOB

a)

RP: One piece of information that goes back to earlier discussions that we’ve had regarding division of labors among the RIRs. I’ve asked Richard to start looking at the functions of the NRO and the virtual staff associated with them, and hopefully I’ll have something ready for you in the near future, prior to our next meeting.

b)

AA: We have an institution in South Africa which wants to give back some address space they got earlier. The problem is there is some space which has been allocated and assigned to organizations. I’m sure you’ve already seen these situations, so I would like how you deal with them.

PW: I can share with you our system for verifying the details of the address holders. The process by which the person claiming to have rights must provide some statutory declaration basically stating that they are the holders, provide documentation about their clients and also warranting that there are not other claims on that address space that they’re aware of, etc.

RP: We do something similar.

c)

AA: Is there any common agreement between all of you to send your administrative assistants to two RIR meetings a year?

AP: There is no formal agreement at all, it is decided on a case-by-case basis.

RP: My executive assistant goes to the RIR meetings, but the other meetings I decide this on a case-by-case basis.

There being no further business to discuss, the meeting was adjourned at 12:20 UTC.

NEW ACTION LIST

NRO EC 05-48 050721
RP to bring the matter before the ARIN board. If the they decide to make a formal statement, RP to provide the statement to PW who will take it to his EC.

NRO EC 05-49 050721
ALL: General discussion that has to result in a position statement from the NRO to the ICANN board in relation to these conflicts of interests; this statement must cover more than just the members from our particular interest group but also members from other interest groups.

NRO EC 05-50 050721
RP. Coordinate with Richard and Federico to work on a backup and recovery plan to use in case of a catastrophic RIR failure.

NRO EC 05-51 050721
RP. To coordinate with ASO AC Chair a procedure for collaborative work between ASO AC and NRO and report back to the EC.

NRO EC 05-52 050721
AP To send a note to the ambassador Khan thanking him for the opportunity to participate in the meeting this week and saying one more time that the NRO is very interested in participating in everything and that we hope to work closely with him, etc.

NRO EC 05-53 050721
AP To add to the thank you note to Ambassador Khan a request for a tentative schedule of the meetings of the subcommittees.

NRO EC 05-54 050721
PW To find out about the deadline for presenting our contribution and about other contributions and contents.

NRO EC 05-55 050721
RP. To talk to Lynn and ask her about what the participation would entail and how we can participate in a meaningful manner.

PREVIOUS OPEN ACTIONS

NRO EC 05-44 050609
AP. To prepare a document, taking in considerations the agreements made in Mar del Plata, regarding the solicitude of designation of GAC Liaison to RIR and share the document to the EC List.

NRO EC 05-45 050609
AP. To formally asks Paul Twomey an official announcement from ICANN Board for the ratification of the IPv4 Global Policy.

NRO EC 05-46 050609
RP. To request a list of actions items to the ECG Chair

NRO EC 05-47 050609
AP. To send a message to RIR Engineering chair team to coordinate a plan for deprecation of ip6.int

NRO-EC 05-29 050412
AP To take to Maputo meeting the documents regarding to the AFRICA allocations made by RIPE and need now by AFRINIC

NRO-EC 05-22 050315
RP To prepare one last version of a document of contract services with our comments on this and send it to the EC.

NRO-EC 05-24 050315
RE Send the IPv6 Global Policy document to the ASO AC Chair.

NRO-EC 05-25 050315
RP To prepare an e-mail specifically discussing this aspect of funding AC attendance to ICANN and ASO meetings, and then once we resolve that we can talk about money.

NRO-EC 04-78, 041203
RP to draft plan regarding NRO server placement.

NRO-EC 04-46, 040616
RP to draft request to delegate in-addr.arpa to the NRO. need to look at ipv6.arpa and v6.int, too.

NRO-EC 04-71, 041203
RP to provide comments on ECG chair input.

Last modified on 02/09/2020