Re: IETF LLC & IETF Participation from USA-sanctioned countries

[Keith Moore <[e-mail]>]

On 3/4/21 2:57 PM, Andrew Sullivan wrote:

> In that case, there are multiple issues here.  Off the top of my head:
>
>     • People from sanctioned countries under the laws of wherever the 
> IETF is incorporated may face legal barriers to interactions with the 
> corporate body of the IETF.
>
>     • People from sanctioned countries under any law may face legal 
> barriers in arranging support for or travel to their IETF activities.
>
>     • People from sanctioned countries may have their network 
> connectivity impaired in various ways.
>
>     • People from sanctioned countries under any law may face barriers 
> to arranging payments for any paid IETF activities due to the rules 
> imposed by payment processors.  These may be beyond the control of the 
> IETF and may not be in place or foreseeable at the time of the IETF's 
> contract with the processor, so they may not be possible to fix.

Yes, I think all of those are true, and thanks for the list.

> I do think that it is useful to lay out issues in a way such that the 
> things that are actually addressable get priority.  Geopolitical 
> harmony does not seem to be the barrier to inclusion and diversity 
> that the IETF needs to prioritize compared to some other things that 
> are perhaps closer to home.

I think it makes sense to work on the issues that actually seem to be 
addressable before working on the issues that do not seem addressible, 
but you don't want to prune the list premature. Because sometimes there 
are workarounds that aren't immediately obvious.  (Though perhaps not 
for any of the cases you mention.)

thanks again,

Keith