The Africa Union Summit on ICT and development challenges has kicked off in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, against a backdrop of political and security issues. The summit is expected to discuss ways of accelerating ICT for development but political instability in Madagascar, Nigeria, Somalia, Uganda, Sudan, Democratic Republic of Congo and Ivory Coast means that much of the discussions by the heads of state will be dedicated to peace and security issues. "Maybe the debate on ICT and development will be discussed for more than three hours this time; usually, ICT takes two and a half hours of the three day heads of state meeting and the rest is dedicated to peace and security," said Esam Abulkhirat, a senior ICT policy officer at the AU. 

The meeting started with discussions by the AU Permanent Representatives Committee, drawn from the 53 member states. The PRC will harmonize the program of events ahead of the three-day heads-of-state summit that starts Sunday. "The heads of state meeting will start with an address by Paul Kagame, Rwanda president, Abdoulaye Wade, Senegalese president, Robert Zoellick, World Bank president and Hamadoun Toure, ITU Secretary General," said Jean Mfasoni, secretary to the AU. Notably missing from the heads of states meeting program -- given that domain management and investment in critical Internet infrastructure is key to development -- are presentations from the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN). Most of the African countries have problems managing their domains and politicians have been accused of not dedicating enough resources to critical Internet infrastructure. The AU represents Africa at ICANN's Government Advisory Committee but its role is merely observatory because the AU has no powers to compel members to adopt certain rules and regulations, as the European Union can.  The week long meeting will discuss issues such as ICT infrastructure development, enabling environment for growth, training, research and development. The discussions will lead to resolutions that can will be adopted by the heads of state and constitute part of the AU policy documents.