A Message from His Excellency President Mohammed Hosni Mubarak of Egypt.
Reston, Virginia   March 27, 2000
as posted via America OnLine.

Today I visited the Internet Corridor of Northern Virginia, one of the
world's foremost regions of the industry; and met with Governor Jim Gilmore's
Commission on Information Technology, who has also provided leadership
through his chairmanship of the congressional Advisory Commission on
Electronic Commerce. It was crystal clear how Egypt, as one of the world's
fastest growing markets for the Information industry, promises unlimited
potential of cooperation with the United States in this field. I therefore
chose to extend this digital message directly to the American people through
the largest online community in the world, to highlight some of Egypt's views
on the Information age,

The time through which we are living is unique. The world, is truly
conquering a new stage of human evolution, a fresh phase of civilization. We
are now departing the Industrial Age to the Knowledge Era; just as the
earlier generations witnessed and helped shape the transformation from the
Agriculture based production to the Industrial process of manufacturing. In
our contemporary world, and more so in the future, information will
constitute the most important component of any production operation, and the
paramount source of wealth. Natural resources will be ancillary to knowledge;
physical and financial capital will be subordinate to human investment.

This fundamental change offers numerous opportunities, but also raises
serious challenges. Primary amongst which is the digital divide; both between
nations and within societies. The technology that portrays itself to be
global, needs to be truly so not only in terms of reach, but more importantly
in terms of equal access and mutual benefit. That is not necessarily the case
in many instances; which lays down a salient task to be undertaken by the
world community, as a whole. These new technologies need to be geared towards
the advancement of the developing world. The countries, previously known as
the Third World, can not afford to miss what is currently known as the Third
Wave. Every effort must be made to utilize the new technologies to support
leapfrog development strategies. Technology transfer is the only vehicle to
make sure that the world, now coming together by technology, does not fall
apart by inequality and the neglect of the basic needs of the world's poor.
Venture capitalism, fuelling risky start up business companies, needs to be
matched by Venture Development, financing creative ideas aiming at improving
the living standard of the neediest. The Digital Gap of income and education
unevenness needs to be bridged by digital opportunities of new tools and
equipment. The Telerevolution, exemplified by telemedecine and teleeducation,
shortens physical distance separating those in need from the service or
commodity that they want. It thus provides a unique opportunity for the
projection of talents across borders and exchange of experiences across
different systems.


Wedded to these developmental challenges that the Information and
Communications revolution has brought about, are cultural issues that need to
be addressed. The Internet was first developed in the United States,
spreading therefrom to the rest of the world, while the American people
remain the largest users and benefactors. Resulting was that this medium is
mainly English language centered. But the Internet needs to preserve the
richness of the heterogeneity of the world languages and cultures. Today,
Egyptian Virginian cooperation has started with the aim to include Arabic
characters in the development of domain name registration, which is further
testimony to Egypt's strategic role as the main hub for technology transfer
in the neighboring regions of Africa and the Arab World. It is part and
parcel of Egypt's keen interest in enhancing the role of the Emerging
economies, not only in benefiting from the use the rising new technologies,
the Internet primary amongst them, but more importantly in shaping their
very development, and contributing to their advancement. This inclusiveness
is essential to avoid the perception of cultural hegemony, and to protect the
world's unity that could only be cherished by the very its diversity in the
value systems and beliefs. Respect for these and non intrusiveness are
necessary pillars on which this new technology can build its global
information infrastructure. That means that the

The changes in technologies, their developmental challenges and the cultural
repercussions all construct a new international system; whereby states still
play the leading role on the world arena, but also share the field with
civil society and the multinational corporations. Since globalization is a
well established fact, it is more important now, than in any other time, to
make sure that the foundations of the international system that enabled it to
survive in the modern history, continue to be able to do so in the future.
Governments have a legitimate role to play and are the only representative
institutions who speak for their peoples. While, there certainly is a growing
positive role for other actors, states remain the pillar of the international
society and international law must remain the governing code of conduct. The
challenge is to allow for room for the new changes, accommodating the new
online communities and the transnational networks. For this reason, I
inaugurated in Virginia today the domain names of all our more than one
hundred embassies abroad in a signal that virtual diplomacy is now the tool
to conduct international affairs the Information age.

These are all but a few issues on the agenda of the new economy, media and
world. Egypt has started tackling many of them in concrete steps and well
designed policies. She benefits from her rich heritage stemming from its long
history; for the future of the Information Age can only be successfully
realized by the knowledge of the wisdom of the past.