UN Assembly wraps up high-level forum on information technologies for development

With the digital divide threatening to further marginalize the economies and peoples of many developing countries, the challenge of transforming this imbalance into opportunities required international commitment and cooperation, the President of the United Nations General Assembly said today as the body wrapped up a high-level meeting on information and communications technologies (ICT) for development.

Speaking this afternoon at the conclusion of the Assembly's two-day meeting on ICT, Han Seung-soo of the Republic of Korea said that the UN and other international organizations had been recognized as catalysts for fostering digital opportunities and putting ICT at the service of development.

The session welcomed the establishment of the UN ICT Task Force, which was becoming a key forum on how the technology could help achieve the Millennium Development Goals and in promoting policy coherence and coordination among international initiatives.

"The realization of the potential of ICT for development requires a broad international commitment of political leaders to act in concert," Mr. Han said. "It is up to us to bridge the digital divide and turn it into a digital opportunity."

Earlier today, the head of the UN International Telecommunication Union (ITU) said that political leaders, particularly those in the developing countries, should make investing in the new information technologies their number one priority policy issue.

ITU Secretary-General Yoshio Utsumi told a press conference at UN Headquarters in New York that statistics compiled by his agency showed that the "digital divide" was rapidly narrowing in some parts of Asia while it was widening in Africa.

That reality meant that leaders should use ICT as a tool to "leapfrog" their countries' development into the information delivery society, Mr. Utsumi said. While acknowledging that developing nations had many other priorities, he said leaders should seriously consider and understand the importance and the opportunities presented by the new information technologies in advancing the development of their countries.

As for the World Summit on Information Technology, Mr. Utsumi said the Assembly's two-day meeting was part of those preparations, as issues for the conference were also being developed. Since the conference would discuss "so many multi-sectoral issues," he added, next year's second preparatory committee meeting would target the contents of the Summit and discuss its possible outcome.

The Summit will be held in two phases, with the first held next year in Geneva and the second in 2005 in Tunis.