Dear Sir,

It is my pleasure to invite you to participate in the Connect CIS Summit from 26 to 27 November 2009 in Minsk, Belarus. This Summit, which will attract leaders from government, industry and financial institutions among others, will be hosted by His Excellency Mr. Alexander Lukashenko, President of the Republic of Belarus.

ITU is organizing the Connect CIS Summit in partnership with the Regional Commonwealth in the Field of Communications, the Commonwealth of Independent States Executive Committee, the World Bank, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, the European Investment Bank, the Islamic Development Bank, the United Nation’s Economic Commission for Europe and the United Nation’s Global Alliance for ICT and Development among others.

The aim of the Summit is to mobilize the human, financial and technical resources required to bridge the existing gaps in ICT infrastructure in order to support economic growth, employment and development across the countries and surrounding region of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS). In addition, the Summit will provide a unique platform for executive-level networking and partnership building, as well as for the launch of multi-stakeholder partnerships and new initiatives in support of this aim.

Leaders at the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) in Geneva in 2003 and Tunis in 2005 recognized the significant role of ICT as a catalyst to help realize the United Nations Millennium Development Goals and agreed to a set of targets, including ten connectivity goals to be achieved by 2015. With less than six years until 2015, and in this period of global economic crisis, it is all the more important that all partners work together to ensure urgent action on these shared challenges. This is the impetus behind the Connect series of events, the next of which is of course Connect CIS.

Your presence at the Connect CIS Summit will surely strengthen the collaborative bond between our organizations, already cemented in the policy and regulatory domains. To facilitate preparations for this important event, I would be grateful if you could confirm your participation at your earliest convenience. For more information about the Summit, please visit http://www.itu.int/ITU-D/connect/cis/index.html.

I look forward to your support for the success of the Connect CIS Summit.

Yours faithfully,

Dr. Hamadoun I. Touré