The second edition of Afghanistan School on Internet Governance was organized by National IT Professionals Association of Afghanistan in between 29th 30th April and 1st of May 2018 in collaboration with ISOC Afghanistan Chapter in Kabul, Afghanistan. The event (AfSIG 2018) was supported by key National and International organizations including Ministry of communication and information technology of Afghanistan (MCIT), Afghan Telecommunication Regulatory Authority (ATRA), Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), Asia Pacific Top Level Domains Association (apTLD), Kardan University, BlueSonic, RaTech, and IO – Global.
The first two days of School was conducted at Kardan University in Kabul, providing academic environment to the participants, which was greatly appreciated by all. While the 3rd day was jointly organized with ISOC Afghanistan Chapter on the day zero of IGFA.
AfSIG 2018 was able to train 30 new students, from different stakeholder groups, in Internet Governance with the help of 26 National and International speakers. The participant’s registration process was established on the event website at sig.afig.af where, for the selection purpose, besides applicant’s responses to the questions other diversity factors were also considered such as gender, stakeholder group, previous involvement at similar activities etc.
The event received financial support from two local private companies namely Blue Sonic and Ra-tech, while ISOC Afghanistan Chapter supported the 3rd day refreshments only.
IO-Global, an Internet Service Provider, setup broadband internet service at the venue. The internet facility was critical for remote presentations and as well as for the participants’ internet use during the 3 days.
The primary objective of the Afghanistan School on Internet Governance (AfSIG) is to help individuals from Afghanistan to understand the national, regional and international Internet Governance issues, settings, and processes, while gaining access to comprehensive and structured knowledge on various aspects of Internet Governance, and the actors, issues and settings surrounding it.
The first edition of Afghanistan School on Internet Governance was organized in between 26th-27th April 2017 by NITPAA for two days, where 38 students were trained in Internet Governance. This year NITPAA enhanced the topics and decided to organize it for 3 days instead of two. After the successful completion of the first two editions of school, the event organizers are hopeful in repeating the same school next year for the 3rd time where more Internet Leaders will be trained and a general awareness about the internet governance issues will be attempted again.
Speakers of the event.
Shahzad Gul Aryobee, MCIT; Javid Hamdard, NetLinks, NITPAA; A. Khalil Azizi, NITPAA, BlueSonic; Hasibullah Milad, Government, Satish Babu, APRALO ICANN; Leoned Tedorov, apTLD; Baher Esmat, ICANN; Nadia Hashimi, MCIT .af; Amrita Chudri, CCAOI; Anja Gengo, UN IGF; Marilyn Cade, CEO, mCade Strategies; Chengetai Masango, UN IGF; Shamsullah Shams, NITPAA; Khaksar Weqar, NITPAA; Reza Khawar, MCIT; Akhwanzada, Asan Khedmat MCIT; Naved Ul Haq, ISOC; Wolfgang Kleinwachter, EuroDIG; Zmarialai Wafa, ISOC Afghanistan; Aimal Marjan, Government; Abdul Ghafar Rasooli; Omar Mansoor Ansari, ISOC Afghanistan Chapter; Abdul Saboor Mobariz, ITRCA; Speher; Ahmad Waleed Khaliqi, President NITPAA; And two representatives from ATRA.
For more about AfSIG 2018 please visit the official website of AfSIG @ sig.afig.af
