The Universal Acceptance Regional Coordination Group of CIS and Eastern Europe continues to develop its international ties. In December 2019, it joined the Local Initiatives Working Group of the Universal Acceptance Steering Group (UASG). This cooperation will help it promote the advanced experience and expertise of one of the most actively developing regions in terms of internationalized domain names, and also to receive quality support for its initiatives from the UASG.
The UASG, a leading group on universal acceptance, was established in January 2015 at the initiative of the internet community and is currently operating with the support of ICANN. It is a global structure which accumulates knowledge and materials on universal acceptance by employing renowned international experts in this area. In 2019, five working groups were created within the UASG that deal with various aspects of universal acceptance of internationalized domain names (IDNs), new gTLDs and email addresses that use non-Latin alphabets. These groups include the Local Initiatives Working Group.
Members of the Universal Acceptance Regional Coordination Group of CIS and Eastern Europe have worked out a plan to promote universal acceptance in their countries. At the moment, the group comprises experts from seven countries (Russia, Armenia, Belarus, Ukraine, Georgia, Serbia and Latvia), with 12 delegated top-level IDNs (.РФ, .МОСКВА, .ДЕТИ, .SU, .հայ, .БЕЛ, .УКР, .UA, .გე, .СРБ, .RS and .LV). The domain .РФ has more than 740,000 domain names; it is the world’s largest Cyrillic domain and second largest national IDN domain.
“The issues of universal acceptance are currently being discussed at various IGF platforms; they are included in ICANN’s strategic plan for 2021-2025, and this means that the importance of the subject is recognized at the highest level. Our cooperation with the UASG will help speed up the exchange of experience and improve its efficiency, as well as develop mutual expert support. Our regional group has unique practical experience, and we are ready to share it with the international community and experts. We are an example for future local initiatives in other regions,” said Maria Kolesnikova, head of the Universal Acceptance Regional Coordination Group of CIS and Eastern Europe.
