Yoshio Itsumi, secretary general of ITU, said the organization recognizes it has a changing role in the standardization of telecommunications and the increasing convergence of computers and communications, but said that is not a diminishing role.

Also at Telecom 99, the European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI) acknowledged the fundamental nature of the Internet and of Internet Protocol (IP) to all future forms of communications. ETSI (Sophia Antipolis) is also seeking to provide input but said that it already has influence as a founding member of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN).

Speaking prior to the opening of the telecom summit here, Itsumi said, "Bottom-up technology developments rather than top-down policy-driven development is becoming quite popular and dominant in the world. They will get bigger but the role of the ITU will not diminish at all.

"There is no one rule for [how] standards [are created]," he said. "The ITU does not want to dominate standardization processes but, rather, coordinate those standards for which the ITU is the appropriate body."

Addressing the increasing role of the Internet in all forms of communication, Itsumi said, "The Internet was created by grass roots activities and then penetrated the world. Many standards bodies now have to get involved, including the ITU."

ETSI is "also trying to get involved in the Internet," an ETSI spokesman said. "Not only in setting specifications but also in governance. We've got a pretty good system here and the Internet is peppered throughout our work.

"We believe there may be an addressing issue with mobile phones and that's an area where we have a lot of people and expertise," the spokesman said.

The possibility of problems with mobile IP addresses, despite the recent publication of IPv6, a version of the Internet Protocol with massively extending addressing capability, was echoed by Jorma Ollila, chairman and chief executive officer of Nokia, during a briefing here.

"IP addressing so that we can be connected away from our home network is an issue," Ollila said. "IPv6 is being worked on making it possible for roaming, but always these things take time. It's nothing very dramatic. It is just work to be done."

The ITU currently has almost no formal involvement in deciding the course of the Internet's development, which is largely in the hands of U.S. dominated bodies such as the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) and ICANN.

"The U.S. has rightly consulted with many countries," Itsumi said. "The Internet has become a very basic part of the world. The role of the ITU will become much more important." Itsumi declined to say how the ITU should be involved in the Internet, but said it was the subject of a report being prepared within the ITU.

"The council [of the ITU] is very proactive in getting ITU involved in all aspects of the Internet, including domain naming. I have instructed staff to prepare for greater involvement," he said.