UNESCO advocates multi-stakeholder partnerships for inclusive digital futures at EuroDIG 2026

This year's edition also marked the European Commission's celebration of the 20th anniversary of the .eu top-level domain , highlighting two decades of European digital identity and cooperation. Xianhong Hu, UNESCO Programme Specialist, showcased a newly launched UNESCO-ICANN joint Policy Brief on Advancing Universal Acceptance of All Domain Names and Email Addresses for a Multilingual Internet .

Universal Acceptance is essential to ensuring that all valid domain names and email addresses work equally across languages and scripts. Ms Hu emphasized that language barriers still limit meaningful connectivity of significant population, including indigenous peoples. "Mainstreaming UA requires multi-stakeholder collaboration among governments, the technical community, academia, civil society and the private sector," she added.

Sarmad Hussain, Senior Director of ICANN, highlighted the need for Universal Acceptance of all domain names and email addresses, and pointed out that the UA Policy Brief contributes to reinforcing commitments toward a multilingual Internet.