The EU last week proposed what it called "an international government involvement at the level of principles" in overseeing the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers. The U.S.-backed agency comes up with the technical rules that allow the Internet's billion users to post and visit Web sites. The EU -- supported by its telecommunications companies -- long has urged giving all governments a share of the indirect oversight role currently handled by the U.S. Department of Commerce. However, some telecom companies have objected to the European Commission's latest move. "I've been getting urgent calls from our members, and they are upset," says Michael Bartholomew, director of the European Telecommunications Network Operators Association, which represents 42 major companies in 35 countries. EU Commission spokesman Martin Selmayr insisted that that his organization's position was being misinterpreted. "We categorically oppose any direct government involvement with Icann," he said. In an email to Mr. Bartholomew sent yesterday, chief EU negotiator Peter Zangl wrote that the EU opposes "involvement of governments in the day-to-day management of Internet resources" and instead supports a "multi-stakeholder, public-private partnership" in overseeing Icann. ... "It introduced a proposal that went a long way towards the position that a number of states headed by Iran had been advocating, opening for a political control mechanism," Carl Bildt, former Swedish prime minister and chairman of Swedish telecom Teleopti, wrote on his web log. It was, he added, "a U-turn by the European Union that was as unexpected as it was disturbing."

It's like I posted to Slashdot: why would the EU and the UN want to grab control, when that control right now is only being used for laissez faire? Because they want to /stop/ the laissez faire! China wants to take down Tibetan and Falun Gong sites. Germany wants to ban neonazis from the internet. The arab nations would want to kick off Israel until it "fulfils its international obligations". Etc etc. This is nothing less than an attempt to stuff the information genie back into its bottle. At all costs, they must be prevented from claiming the spurious moral high ground! Confront them with the question: what would you change? And, why not go through process at ICANN? What would you want to do, that they would refuse? And why?