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The United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs, in cooperation with the Inter-Parliamentary Union and the Parliament of Uruguay,  organized a three-day Regional Workshop for Latin American parliaments on “ICT Strategic Planning and Use of Social Media in Parliaments”, hosted by the Parliament of Uruguay in Montevideo on 23, 24 and 25 October 2013.

The workshop was organized within the framework of the Exchange Network of Parliaments of Latin America and the Caribbean (ENPLAC) and built on previous activities carried out by UN/DESA in Latin America through the Global Centre for ICT in Parliament and the project funded through the United Nations Development Account Supporting the Establishment of a Latin American Parliamentary Knowledge Network.

The Open Government Partnership, National Democratic Institute, and the Congress of Chile will hold a webinar to introduce the Legislative Openness Working Group (LOWG) on 10 September 2013. The LOWG is intended to deepen the exchange of knowledge across governments, parliaments, civil society and international institutions on the opportunities and challenges associated with legislative openness.

The Council of Federation of the Federal Assembly of the Russian Federation held an EPCRD seminar “Modern technologies to support parliamentary activities - traditions and challenges" in Saint Petersburg (19-21 September 2013). This seminar was organized by the Council of Federation, in cooperation with the Secretariat of the Interparliamentary Assembly of Member Nations of the Commonwealth of Independent States (IPA CIS), in the framework of the ECPRD Area of interest "Parliamentary Practice & Procedures".

The presentations and videos of the latest ECPRD meetings are now online.

• ECPRD ICT Seminar
  "Open the window, close the door"
  Budapest, 15-16 November 2012
• Parliaments on the Net X
  Mobility, Transparency and open parliament: best practices in Parliamentary web sites
  Madrid, 31 May - 1 June 2012
• Annual meeting of the ECPRD Working Group on Information and Communication Technologies (ICT)
  “Do more with less: tight budgets and improved IT services to MPs and Administration
  Athens,  11-12 November 2011

La Conferencia Mundial de 2012 sobre el Parlamento electrónico está organizada conjuntamente por las Naciones Unidas y la Unión Interparlamentaria, a través del Centro Mundial para las TIC en el Parlamento, y hospedada por la Cámara de Diputados de Italia en Roma.

La Conférence mondiale 2012 sur l’e-Parlement a eu lieu à la Chambre des députés d'Italie, à Rome, les 13, 14 et 15 Septembre. La clôture de la Conférence a coincidé avec la Journée internationale de la démocratie, établie en 2008 par l'Assemblée générale des Nations Unies.

• Read the Report of the World e-Parliament Conference 2012

The World e-Parliament Conference 2012 was held at the Chamber of Deputies of Italy, in Rome, on 13, 14 and 15 September.

In the framework of the European Commission funded project “Support to ICT Strategic Planning in the SADC Parliaments,” the Global Centre recently completed a second technical assistance mission to the Parliament of Botswana from 6 to 8 June 2012.

Between 21 and 25 May a technical assistance mission team visited the Senate of Haiti in Port-Au-Prince. The team consisting of a UN representative, and two experts kindly provided by the House of Commons of Canada, and the Swiss Federal Parliament, conducted an assessment of the state of ICT, and made a mapping of future ICT needs. This first mission will be followed by a second mission in June that will focus on the development of an ICT strategic plan for the Senate of Haiti.

Following the Global Centre for ICT in Parliament's first technical assistance missions to the National Assembly of the Democratic Republic of the Congo in March 2012 and the Senate of the Democratic Republic of the Congo in April 2012, respectively, where the ICT capabilities of both chambers were assessed, a second technical assistance mission took place from 21 to 25 May 2012. The follow-up joint-mission, which fell within the framework of the European Commission funded project “Support to ICT Strategic Planning in the SADC Parliaments,” finalised the assessment reports from both first missions while also submitting individual draft ICT strategic plans to the National Assembly and Senate for their respective consideration.

Between 30 April and 10 May a technical assistance mission team from the Global Centre for ICT in Parliament, with expertise kindly provided by the Senate of the Netherlands, carried out an evaluation of the state of ICT at the National Assembly of St. Kitts and Nevis, and assisted the parliamentary officials with the formulation of an ICT Strategic Plan for the National Assembly, including a vision statement for the use of ICT, strategic goals, objectives and an implementation road map.

At the Conference "PMO Leaders Conference on Parliamentary Transparency and Networking" concluded on 2 May 2012, parliamentary monitoring organizations (PMOs) from all regions of the world shared their experiences and good practices on a host of topics, from monitoring political finance to advocating for greater transparency of parliamentary information. The PMOs at the conference agreed to continue to work together in a number of concrete areas, including a shared declaration of principles on parliamentary transparency.

Following the Global Centre for ICT in Parliament's first technical assistance mission to the Assembly of the Republic of Mozambique in September 2011, where an assessment of the Assembly's ICT capabilities was taken, a second technical assistance mission took place from 23 to 27 April 2012.