The WSIS+10 Review concluded on Wednesday, 27 February with a lively multi-stakeholder debate across a large number of panel sessions. All sessions were asked to produce recommendations to feed into the final UNESCO statement “Information and Knowledge for All an Expanded Vision and a Renewed Commitment”.  

WSIS Day 3

IFLA contributed to the open drafting meetings by conveying the recommendations from the two sessions on Ownership of digital media and Public Access to the Internet.

IFLA welcomes a specific mention of public access in the final statement:

Pursue the goal of universal access to, and preservation of, information in order to build sustainable knowledge societies. In the quest for universal access to information and knowledge, attention should be paid to infrastructure, accessibility to quality multilingual content and application of knowledge, public access and building capacities of people to leverage information for sustainable development."

The UNESCO WSIS+10 final statement will inform and contribute to the WSIS review process leading to the 2014 evaluation organized by the International Telecommunications Union (ITU) and the final 2015 review organized by the  UN General Assembly. The final statement  from the UNESCO meeting is a non-binding recommendation grounded on a broad multistakeholder support. 

At the WSIS+10 several sessions focused on Internet governance issues in line with special events on Internet freedom organized by UNESCO.The increasing convergence of the Internet governance issues and themes with the WSIS action lines was also stressed by the sessions dedicated to enhanced cooperation on Internet critical resources. The closing ceremony called for a large multistakeholder participation in the next steps of the Working Group on Enhanced Cooperation hosted by the UN Commission on Science and Technology for Development (CSTD).