Mr Secretary-General, Your Excellencies, Distinguished Delegates, and Ladies and Gentlemen.

Let me begin by thanking you all for the confidence and trust you have placed in my me.

It is a great honor to serve as the Chair of WTPF-21, the first we are having since last meeting in 2013.

I am truly grateful to the members of the Informal Working Group, led by the Chairman Mr Fabio Bigi, who have worked tirelessly over the past two years or so to present this Forum with visionary draft Opinions.

I am also mindful of the high expectations attached to the new and emerging technologies at the center of our discussions. I was looking forward to seeing all of you again after all this time, as the WTPF was to be the first physical ITU meeting since the pandemic struck, but that was not to be.

COVID-19 may have prevented us from coming together in person in Geneva, but you can rest assured that it won’t prevent us from discussing the important topics that are on our agenda.

We do it for all the digitally excluded – the women, men, and young people everywhere who are still not using the Internet, let alone the new and emerging technologies that hold so much promise for all humanity.

And we owe it also to ourselves to do our outmost to better harness technologies effectively, to accelerate the achievement of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.

Because when poverty is on the rise, when our children’s education is on the line, and when our planet is suffering, when young people have no hope of getting sustainable jobs, when our health is impaired with existing and new diseases, we believe that these technologies can and will make a big difference in people’s lives.

I look forward to constructive debates, always in the spirit of consensus building and cooperation that characterizes our work in ITU – and to a very successful Forum, in the service of promoting sustainable development.

Let’s make history together. We have a lot of work ahead of us; so let me turn it over to the Secretary-General, who will proceed with the next agenda item regarding the election of the Vice-Chairs.

Mr Secretary-General, the floor is yours.

Thank you.