Notice : For diplomatic reasons, identities of concerned governmental entities are not revealed in some parts of this document.

In contrast with previous PrepComs, the pace of PrepCom2 was definitively too fast, almost frenetic. The negotiations over the texts have been split into "blocks" that are related to one or two paragraphs. Before governments began, in the plenary session, their negotiations on each "block", the Civil Society was given a 5 minutes time allowance, that could be divided into 3 slots lasting less than 2 minutes each ! The SI group provided some comments on Wednesday 17, that were included in the statement by Rik Panganiban, whom is warmly thanked. Negotiations were moving so fast over the blocks, that the Civil Society had problems to be prepared in time to provide comments on the paragraphs that were going to be examined. Another statement by the Working Group was scheduled on Thursday 18, afternoon, before examination of section 30, but the negotiation of section 30 ended on Wednesday morning. So our intervention was no more technically relevant to the paragraphs to be discussed and was cancelled.

At the end of the intersession, we were relatively happy since the item "Open Access" have been included in the section 2 of the Draft Declaration of Principles ( 18 July 2003 ). Then, on Friday 19 September,a first disaster occured : a delegation demanded that article 21-22 be deleted in the declaration of Principles. According to several sources, this request was simply the consequence of a material mistake. This paragraph has been circled in red during internal discussions, and one diplomat mistakenly interpreted this "red circling" as an instruction to request deletion during the plenary. Therefore, the list quoting "Open Access" in the article 21-22 has been deleted. Many delegations and H.E Adama Samassekou were informed of this regrettable mistake, but this not helpful enough to see the item "Open Access" be re-introduced again, despite our efforts.

2) Access to information and knowledge
21-22. Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression including the freedom to seek, receive and impart information and ideas. The sharing and strengthening of global knowledge for development can be enhanced by removing barriers to equitable access to information for educational, scientific, economic, social, political and cultural activities and by easing access to public domain information. Such barriers can be removed by promoting: open access; open standards; the development of multilingual translation software open source software; the widespread availability of public access points


this paragraph became in the 19 September evening version :

3)[2)] Access to information and knowledge
19.[21-22] In building the information society in which everyone has and can exercise the right to freedom of opinion and expression including the freedom to seek, receive and impart information and ideas, [through any media and regardless of frontiers]/[subject to limitations determined by law], the ability for all to access and contribute their information, ideas and knowledge is essential.
20.The sharing and strengthening of global knowledge for development can be enhanced by removing barriers to equitable access to [available] information for economic, social, political, cultural, educational, and scientific activities and by easing access to public domain information.

It was really a shock. Quite a few diplomats were, reportedly (their own words) "stunned". It has a chilling effect on other delegations that we lobbied to support the introduction of the "Open Access" item during the Intersession. The damage to the "Open Access" cause is extremely severe. One can check further drafting work in the 19 - 24 september version .

In the version ( 26 September 2003 ) this section ( now section 3 has been modified beyond recognition :

3)[2)] Access to information and knowledge

Despite the fact that good input of the Scientific community caucus ( a sector-based caucus including representatives of associations of learned societies and engineers, while our group is theme-based. ) ( highlight ) has been introduced in the text, it remains that the term "Open Access" has been substituted by the term equitable access . This term can also be found in the the Scientific community caucus document (WSIS/PC-3/CONTR/113-E 31 May 2003). But, it would be premature to conclude it has been borrowed only from this Caucus input, since the term "equitable access" may also be found unfortunately in statements from some librarian associations.

The term "Open Access" has a precise meaning, related to the "Open Access" activist movement, while the term "Equitable Access" does not correspond to any specific activist movement. It is very vague and non commital. This term is ambiguous and is borrowed from the economical sphere and therefore, we are afraid that it is going to imply that access to knowledge relates to commercial transactions. "Equitable trade" or "Equitable commerce" ( a rather old concept ). ( in french Commerce Equitable ) refers to trade issues that bring unneeded confusion to the declaration of principles. Equitable trade is often assimilated to Fair Trade, bringing yet another layer of semantic confusion. We all know that the WTO means by "fair" "equitable" !. What does it mean ? "equitable" for whom ? the commercial publishers ?. It does not imply at all "Open Access". The term "equitable" is dangerous and must be therefore removed by any means.

During the first week, on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday, ad hoc (states) groups were formed to discuss litigious points of the declaration. None was formed concerning "Access to Information".

• Issue Chair (number of meetings)
• Media Switzerland (3)
• Security Italy for EU (4)
• Enabling Environment Brazil (4)
• Internet Gouvernance Kenya (3)
• Right to Communicate Canada (3 )
• Cultural Identity India (1 )

According to the official rules setup by the secretariat, Civil Society representatives were allowed to issue statements during the first five minutes of each meeting of these groups, and then they should leave the room. During the first three days of the second week, more ad hoc groups were created to work on the plan of action.

• Financing Sweden (4)
• Media Switzerland (3 )
• Security Italy for EU ( 3 )
• Capacity Building Costa Rica (2 )
• Enabling Environment Brazil ( 3 )
• Access to Information Kenya ( 3 )
• ICT Applications Egypt ( 3 )
• Infrastructure Saudi Arabia(3 )
• Cultural Diversity Argentina(2 )

• Tuesday 23 September, 8H-9H, Room 17 CICG
• Tuesday 23 September, 14H-15H, Room 17 CICG
• Wednesday 14H-15H, Room 17 CICG

As a basis for discussions, we started with the last version of the Intersession ( 22 August ) Of specific interest is paragraph 15-e :

Establish a programme, funded by the UN (or its agencies), to create a worldwide portal to open access journals and books, and an open archive for scientific information.

This text is somekind of an imcomplete summary of our recommandations included in the observers's contribution at PrepCom2. We felt that many of our original recommandation should not have been left away.

During the first meeting, Tuesday 23, early morning, from my personnal recollection, were present the representatives of the followings states ( alphebetical order ): Canada, China, Europe, India, Kenya, Sudan, USA. Few other persons were also present. I proposed the following language :

The EU proposition I am refering to, is part of the "Drafting Suggestions by the EU" ( Council of the European Union, Geneva, 19 September).

The chair Kenya was very friendly and allowed me to stay during the debates, while of course, I was not allowed to speak or intervene. No delegation, as it happened in most other ad hoc working groups, raised a point of order and requested the chair to ask civil society representatives to leave the room. One explanation is that I had previously discussed of the issue of Open Access with the following delegations that were present :

China: Dr. Shu-Kun Lin and me discussed with the Chinese delegation that was fully aware that the Ocean University at Qindao was supporting MDPI Open Access journals.

Europe: The french delegation has been extremely supportive.

India: I had numerous discussions with people in the Indian delegation. All the journals of the Indian Academy of Science are Open Access journals.

USA: I had many interesting discussions, mostly with a NSF representative that was quite knowledgeable of the Open Access movement and the Sabo bill.

The Tuesday 23 morning meeting was pretty positive. Sudan was backing my proposal. China, the EU, India and the USA were not objecting. The chair asked Sudan and the EU to finalize the language.

Encouraged by this positive turn of events, I added on the Tuesday 23, Afternoon, the following language suggestions :

The afternoon session began very well. The room was crowded. Many delegates were standing up. Sudan told the chair that he was backing my recommandation "as is", but very unfortunatly he had to leave to attend another meeting. When we moved to the paragraph on "Open Access", disaster stroke like a lightning in a blue sky : a delegate, just arrived in Geneva the day before, unknown to me, proposed to delete the paragraph in order to "enlarge it", while proposing a very vague formulation that was truely enlarging the scope of the recommandation, but without providing any practical support !. Then, the hell began, while I could not utter a word. I was not authorized to !. German, Danish and Finish civil society representatives that were part of their respective national delegations were powerless. Needless to say, in the turmoil, my new set of recommandation was not even alluded to !. The chair (Kenya) noticed my dispair and tried to limit the damages. After the end of session, the chair took the informal initiative to encourage me to contact the delegations that were involved in the specific discussion of this item. It appeared later that the disastrous proposition of the newly arrived diplomat was a personnal initiative that did not reflect the true position of the governement he/she was representing. After discussions with the ambassador of the concerned government, the said diplomat was instructed to modify his/her position. The problem was that other governements, up to this point benevolent, began to argue. There were really stressfull times !!!. Finally the "version of the chair" for the last meeting was :
i)) Encourage the creation of a [programme and mechanisms] to support free and affordable access to open access journals and books, and open archive for scientific information.

Finally the language that was agreed upon was the weakest commoun factor, and it is now included (Paragraph 11 i) in the last version of the Plan of Action (26 September 2003):

This language is very weak, It does not imply any official UN support and funding. I feel it is an half-baked language that badly needs to be re-written. It is a disaster.

Dr. Johanson is thanked for presenting a proposition of new language at the Ad Hoc Governmental Working Group on "Enabling Environment" ( Wednesday, 24 September, 08-09H Room 18 CICG Chair: Brazil ). Unfortunately, he was invited to leave the room after reading his statement.

We thank the chair (Egypt) of the ad hoc working group concerning ICT Applications, to provide us with the current "version of the chair". We were reassured to notice that there was no obvious threat to our recommandations in this section.

Until the end of the conference, I continued to refine new recommandations, taking into objections and advices, and discussing with delegations