Ref.:

RPM-AMS/CEO/DM-188

Geneva, 24 July 2009

For your reply

Contact:

Juan Zavattiero, Head, ITU Regional Office for the Americas, Brasilia

E-mail:

juan.zavattiero@itu.int

Fax:

+55 61 2312-2738

Tel:

+55 61 2312-2730

Emamgholi Behdad
Head, Projects and Initiatives Department, BDT
Geneva, Switzerland

E-mail:

emamgholi.behdad@itu.int

Fax:

+41 22 730 5484

Tel:

+41 22 730 5448

Subject:

Regional Preparatory Meetings (RPMs) for the Americas region, Santa Marta (Colombia), 9‑11 September 2009

Dear Sir/Madam,

I have pleasure in inviting you to participate, as an observer, in the Regional Preparatory Meeting for the Americas region (RPM-AMS) for the 2010 World Telecommunication Development Conference, to be held in Santa Marta, Colombia, from 9 to 11 September 2009 at the kind invitation of the Government of Colombia.

Regional Preparatory Meetings are organized in response to Resolution 31 (Rev. Doha, 2006) in a bid to achieve greater regional coordination and engage Members in the WTDC-10 process early on. They also seek to identify issues, at the regional level, that need to be addressed to foster the development of telecommunications and of information technologies, taking into account the expression of pressing needs facing the Member States and Sector Members of the region.

The RPM-AMS is expected to draw up recommendations on carefully selected top priority areas identified as essential for the ICT development of the countries of the region, within which Study Group Questions, programmes, projects and regional initiatives can be identified for consideration by WTDC‑10. To this end, to facilitate effective preparations by the Members of the ITU Telecommunication Development Sector (ITU-D), a very focused RPM-AMS agenda based on the general framework provided by the preliminary draft WTDC‑10 agenda has been prepared and is found in Annex I.

Registration will be made exclusively online at
http://www.itu.int/ITU-D/conferences/rpm/2009/ams/Registration.html.

Practical information relating to the meeting will shortly be available on that website.

I very much look forward to fruitful discussions to ensure that the Action Plan to be prepared by WTDC-10 is an effective and viable tool to guide our work in the coming years to meet the needs of countries of the Americas region based on the top priorities you will have set.

Yours faithfully,

[Original signed]

Sami Al Basheer Al Morshid

Director

Distribution:

–       Regional telecommunication organizations from the Americas region not member of the ITU-D Sector

–       Intergovernmental organizations operating satellite systems from the Americas region not member of the ITU-D Sector

–       United Nations

–       Specialized agencies and the International Atomic Energy Agency