R 122104Z MAY 09
FM SECSTATE WASHDC
TO USMISSION GENEVA

UNCLAS STATE 048479 
 
 
PASS IEA FOR D.SALAZAR 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: ECPS AORC ITU
SUBJECT: ITU TELECOMMUNICATION STANDARDIZATION ADVISORY 
GROUP MEETING, APRIL 28-30, 2009 
 
¶1. Summary.  This is a report of the results of a meeting of 
the Telecommunication Standardization Advisory Group (TSAG), 
which met for three days in Geneva from April 28-30, 2009. 
TSAG is a meeting of Member States and Sector Members of the 
International Telecommunication Union (ITU).  It is 
responsible for reviewing the ITU Telecommunication Sector 
(ITU-T) priorities, work programs, operations, financial 
matters and strategies.  It provides guidelines for the work 
of the study groups.  It advises the Director of the TSB on 
corrective measures to achieve the objectives set forth in 
the operational plan. 
 
There were eleven people on the U.S. delegation.  The 
delegation was led by James Ennis, EEB/CIP/MA from the State 
Department.  The delegation included representatives from 
Commerce (NTIA), FCC, and DHS.  From the private sector, 
companies represented on the delegation included AT&T, Cisco, 
Alcatel-Lucent, and Telcordia.  These individuals included 
the Chairmen of two of the ten ITU-T Study Groups. 
 
¶2.   As an initial matter, we understand that the current 
Chair of TSAG, John Visser, formerly of Nortel, may not be 
able to continue because he has no funding to attend future 
meetings.  If he does not find funding and has to step down, 
he would be replaced by one of the current Vice-Chairs of 
TSAG.  The front runner to replace Visser would probably be 
the U.S. Vice-Chair, Steve Trowbridge.  However, Steve says 
that he is in an operational part of his company, 
Alcatel-Lucent, and would not be able to devote the 80% of 
his time that the Chairmanship of TSAG would require. 
 
¶3.   Another item of note is that the Director of the TSB, 
Malcolm Johnson, appears to be already running for 
re-election, and to this end is courting the votes of 
developing countries.  This manifests itself in various ways. 
 An example at this meeting was his strongly expressed desire 
to hold the next TSAG meeting on dates that are adjacent to 
the meeting of the Telecommunication Development Advisory 
Council (TDAG) meeting, to enable developing countries to 
attend both meetings.   This would have placed the TSAG 
meeting in the middle of the week when Geneva is having a car 
show and when there are no hotel rooms to be had at a 
reasonable price.   (The decision as to the location of the 
next TSAG meeting is now being re-studied.) 
 
¶4.   This meeting itself was a preview of several issues that 
will be probably be discussed at the ITU Council at its 
meeting in October 20-30, 2009. 
 
ITU Mark.  WTSA Resolution 76 addresses the issue of the 
creation of an ITU mark.  It instructs the Director of the 
TSB to take a number of steps in that regard.  He is to: 
(a) conduct exploratory activities in each region in order to 
identify and prioritize the problems developing countries 
face related to achieving interoperability of ICT equipment 
and services; 
(b) based on the results of (1), study the effect on the ITU 
and the manufacturers; the legal and international regulatory 
implications; the costs of setting up a testing facility and 
location of such a facility;  and what needs to be done to 
build-up the human resources necessary for such an effort; 
(c) study the concept of establishing an ITU mark to indicate 
that  equipment that conforms to the ITU mark has a degree of 
interoperability with other such equipment; 
(d) to study the financial and legal implications for the 
ITU-T and for ICT industries, and all other concerns raised; 
(e) to involve experts and external entities as appropriate. 
 
WTSA Resolution 76 also instructs the Study Groups to 
identify as soon as possible existing and future ITU-T 
Recommendations that would be candidates for interoperability 
and to modify them so that they could serve as a basis for 
conducting conformity and interoperability tests. 
 
¶5.  The Director gave a summary of where the TSB is in this 
process.  He said that the experts in (4) above were 
volunteers and that they were from various regions and he was 
relying on them to address (a) above, namely to identify the 
problems that developing countries had with interoperable 
equipment.   It was agreed that other experts could ask to be 
on the TSAG team.  However, the question remains whether the 
Director,s approach meets the spirit of the obligation to 
conduct exploratory activities in each region in order to 
identify the problems they face in achieving 
interoperability.  It was the view of the delegation that the 
Director has already concluded that there is a need for an 
ITU Mark and therefore is only paying lip service to the Res 
76 requirement that he investigate the nature of the 
developing-country problem that we are trying to solve. 
 
The U.S. joined with Portugal and Finland in associating with 
a German contribution that stated that the Director of the 
TSB needs  to be complete the first three work items in 
paragraph 4 above before the Study Groups should have to 
identify recommendations that are potential candidates. 
However, this was a minority opinion. 
 
¶6.  Climate change.  TSAG decided that the Study Group 5 
should be the lead Study Group on climate change.  The name 
of Study Group 5 was changed to "Environment and Climate 
Change."   In addition, a Joint Coordination Activity (JCA) " 
which is a coordination activity involving all the Questions 
in all the ITU-T Study Groups that have an interest in 
climate change and the environment " was created.  It will 
report to SG5, but TSAG will also be kept informed of the 
JCA,s work.  The terms of reference for this JCA were 
drafted and approved at this meeting.  The U.S. supported 
these decisions but took a reservation on the new name for 
SG5 because it believed the title should not include the word 
change. 
 
¶7.   Paperless meetings.  The U.S. submitted a contribution 
to the TSAG meeting saying that in its view, completely 
paperless Study Group meetings were not desirable and that up 
to two sets of the most important documents at a Study Group 
meeting should be made available to each delegation upon 
request.  Subsequently, the U.S. modified this position to 
apply only to policy-level ITU-T meetings, namely Study 
Groups 2, 3, and TSAG.  However, at the meeting the chairman 
of Study Group 17 (a technical Study Group) said Study Group 
17 also did not want paperless meetings.  Study Group 17 
proposed twenty sets of documents, to be made available on a 
first-come, first-serve basis.  The final language that was 
agreed upon was that "it was generally agreed that we should 
aim for less paper at meetings and for as many paperless 
meetings as possible."  This language, in the view of the 
delegation, provides no specific direction for the ITU-T to 
follow and therefore will not resolve the matter. 
 
¶8.  Duration and frequency of TSAG meetings.  The U.S. 
submitted a contribution saying that TSAG meetings should 
typically be five days long in order for it to deal with its 
work.  It also proposed that TSAG meetings should coincide 
with Study Group meeting cycles, or about every 8-9 months. 
France strongly supported the U.S.  However, the Director 
argued that the Council, at its meeting in November 2008, had 
dictated that there would only be one TSAG meeting in 2009. 
With respect to TSAG meetings in 2010, notwithstanding the 
U.S. position, the Chair concluded that TSAG should have one 
meeting for three days in the first quarter of 2010.   He 
gave no explanation as to why he reached this conclusion. 
 
In the view of the U.S. delegation, the decision to recommend 
a three day TSAG meeting next year was an extremely poor 
decision which should be reviewed by Council.  This current 
meeting was a three-day meeting and it was manifestly obvious 
that there was not enough time to get through the work. 
Whole blocs of issues were adopted without any discussion. 
Other issues were postponed to the next meeting.  Still 
others were given only cursory discussion.  It was also clear 
to the delegation that almost all the cost of a TSAG meeting 
is the cost of translation.  Since translation is not 
necessary except in the plenary meetings, the length of a 
TSAG meeting can be extended to five days without 
significantly increasing the cost of the meeting simply by 
meeting in Working Party sessions for three days, sandwiched 
between opening and closing plenary days. 
 
¶9.  Changes to ITU-T Recommendation A.23.  This agenda item 
illustrates the problems caused by a three-day meeting. 
ITU-T Recommendation A.23 relates to collaboration with ISO 
and IETC.  Annex A to A.23 is a Guide this collaboration.  It 
is a normative part of the recommendation.  A 75-page 
contribution modifying this Annex was submitted to this TSAG 
meeting.  It contains changes throughout the Annex.  No one 
introduced this document or explained what the changes were 
about.  The Chair asked that it be determined at this 
meeting, meaning that all the parties present at the meeting 
considered that the changes were acceptable.  The explanation 
the chair gave was that there was no time to review the 
document and that any fixes to the language could be made 
during the TAP review period that follows determination. 
Germany, Russia, and the U.S. objected, saying we had no idea 
what these changes were.  France supported the Chair,s 
proposal.  Despite this, the Chair concluded there was 
consensus in favor of approving/determining the document. 
 
¶10.   The next meeting of TSAG is scheduled to be held in 
Switzerland for three days in the first quarter of 2010.  The 
exact date has not yet been decided. 
 
 
CLINTON