The European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI) and theArab Telecommunications Council of Ministers/League of Arab States(ACTM/LAS) have agreed to cooperate in standardising telecommunications between Europe and the Arab world. The agreement follows several months of discussions and also recognises that ETSI is active in many regions outside Europe, including the Arab states, and its standards are being adopted around the world. Several major Arab telecom players have begun to sign up as associate members of ETSI.A number of technologies standardised by ETSI have been implemented in Arab countries, including Digital Enhanced Cordless Telecommunications (DECT[TM]), Terrestrial Trunked Radio (TETRA) and the Global System for Mobile communication (GSM[TM]). In addition, the widespread use of GSM900 in Arab countries makes co-operation and the exchange of information on Wideband Code Division Multiple Access (W-CDMA) technology more important. One of the new technologies which ETSI is helping to develop in the Third Generation Partnership Project (3GPP[TM]) to enable third generation mobile telecommunications.The agreement was signed by Karl Heinz Rosenbrock, Director-General of ETSI, and Abdrahman Sehebani, Deputy Secretary General for Economic Affairs for the LAS.Rosenbrock comments: “We are very proud this agreement could come live. Not only do Europe and the Arab region have long-standing cultural and historical relations, but ETSI also recognises the strategic importance of the Arab region for telecommunications issues, in particular those concerning standards andstandardisation-related matters.”
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