Cuzco Declaration

The participants of the Ist LATIN AMERICAN AND CARIBBEAN CONFERENCE ON DEVELOPMENT AND USE OF FREE SOFTWARE - LACFREE, meeting in the city of Cusco - Perú from August 11 to 13, 2003, recognize:

1. That Free Software is an integral part of the building of a free, fair, ethical and inclusive society, where people have the opportunity to help each other in mutual solidarity.

2. That Free Software respects the need to preserve multilingualism and cultural identities in cyberspace.

3. That the freedoms given to free software users make it easier for them to become active participants of the knowledge society and not just consumers of technology.

4. That the license policy of proprietary software is not sustainable for the economies of developing countries.

5. That the license model of free software represents an oportunity to achieve equality of rights in the area of technology, reducing the digital divide and helping users with fewer economic resources.

6. That the development that free software has achieved and the potential that it represents, are a clear demonstration that it has a strategic role in creating a knowledge and information society.

7. That the training of human resources with free, fair, ethical and inclusive thinking is a basic requirement for society, and free software is an example of these values.

Hence, we invite the international comunity, in particular govermments and civil society, including the media, to bear in mind during the preparatory work for and the realization of the World Summit on the Information Society, the following:

• To recognize, take on board, and promote the advantages of the use and development of free software, as an integral part of building a knowledge and information society.

• To create within states the political conditions for research and training which favour the appearance and adoption of measures encouraging the free flow of software techniques, algorithms, services, formats, protocols and other requirements of a sustainable and just knowledge and information society.

• To promote legislative norms within the vision of a new legal international paradigm in favour of the use and development of free software. In theconstruction of this new context there shall not exist barriers to the development of programs which respect the four principles which constitute the pillars of free software.

• To give priority to free software in education and health to achieve a scientific training as well as values of ethics and unity.

• To guarantee the adoption of publicly available standards which can be implemented by free software in the infrastructures of both public services and networks.

• To use the advantages of free software to guarantee the security, privacy and perenniality of information, especially in relation to critical infrastructure.

• To guarantee the training of human resources as support for the development of the information society and in particular of free software.

• To develop innovative mechanisms with international community support, aimed at entry to the knowledgment and information society by developing countries in equal conditions. That the treaties for economic cooperation and integration will be updated within this perspective.

Cusco, August 13 2003 (http://open.egov.org.uk/Cuzco_declaration)