Lost in all the discussion around the recent ITU meeting (TIES account required of course) is any discussion of the current policy regarding the formation of new RIRs.

You may recall that one of the reports that the ITU commissioned on this subject suggests that it would be possible, even desirable for the ITU to be allocated a /12 of IPv6 from the IANA to be further allocated to Country Internet Registries.

Here is why that idea can’t possibly happen:

1) The region of coverage should meet the scale to be defined by ICANN, given the need to avoid global address fragmentation

The proposed RIR must operate internationally in a large geographical region of approximately continental size.

Each region should be served by a single RIR, established under one management and in one location. The establishment of multiple RIRs in one region is likely to lead to:

• fragmentation of address space allocated to the region;
• difficulty for co-ordination and co-operation between the RIRs;
• confusion for the community within the region.

This document, which was accepted in 2001 by the ICANN Board of Directors as “a statement of essential requirements for the recognition of new Regional Internet Registries (RIRs), in supplementation to section 9 of the ASO-Memorandum of Understanding, and acknowledged it as a framework for consideration of applications for recognition of new RIRs.” sets out a number of principles that clearly delineate how to start a new RIR. The fact that the ITU commissioned report doesn’t even meet the first principle seems to indicate that the “researchers” didn’t do their “research”.

There are other “Principles” enshrined in this policy as well, which could arguably exclude the ITU from taking on this role:

2) The new RIR must demonstrate that it has the broad support of the LIRs (ISP community) in the proposed region

3) Bottom-up self-governance structure for setting local policies

4) Neutrality and impartiality in relation to all interested parties, and particularly the LIRs

5) Technical expertise

6) Adherence to global policies regarding address space conservation, aggregation and registration

One doesn’t need to argue them at all however, as the first principle clearly excludes the duplication of the RIR functions according to Dr. Ramadass plan. Obviously, if the ITU were to set up a global registry, it would violate the “approximately continental size” requirement, and if there were a global “RIR” run by the ITU it would run afoul of the requirement that “Each region should be served by a single RIR, established under one management and in one location.”

So it’s a non-starter, its quite clear, it just can’t happen according to the current policy. However, since one of the the outcomes of the ITU meeting held on March 15th and 16th is two email “correspondence groups”, one to study outreach and capacity building about IPv6, and the second to study the concerns that developing nations have about IPv6 distribution and how the existing RIR system can address them, it seems we are still going to be discussing this issue going forward.

In the East African country where I live, I have been asked to sit on a 4 person ad hoc committee to further discuss what the “national position” should be on this topic. In my opinion the “national position” should be “let’s just get on with IPv6 deployment and quit worrying about who does the allocating, as that is not going to change!”