Internet Governance Forum
- 28/10/2007
The 2nd meeting of the IGF - Internet Governance Forum was held from 12 - 15 November 2007 in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. The IGF was set up in the scope of the United Nations in the second phase of the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) held in Tunis from 16 -18 November 2005 (see Portugal participates in the World Summit on the Information Society). The 1st IGF meeting took place in Athens from 30 October to 2 November 2006.
As the IGF meeting was held during the Portuguese Presidency of the EU, the European Union was represented by the Portuguese delegation headed by the Minister for Science, Innovation and Higher Education, José Mariano Gago, who made an intervention at the opening session (text in Portuguese) as the President in office of the Council of Ministers of the European Union in charge of Information Society policies.
The delegation also included the President of The Knowledge Society Agency (UMIC), who took over the duties as head of the delegation from the afternoon of 12 November, chairing the meetings of the EU Member States’ delegations and the European Commission to prepare an intervention on behalf of the EU at the "Taking Stock and the Way Forward" session – the last plenary session before the meeting was closed on 15 November.
The meeting was preceded by the Open Consultations and Meeting of the Advisory Group on the Internet Governance Forum on 3-5 September 2007 at the United Nations, Geneva. When the United Nations Secretary-General renewed the Advisory Group's mandate on 20 August , the 47-member group was given a new member structure which included a member from Portugal for the first time, namely Luis Magalhães, President of The Knowledge Society Agency (UMIC).