 Welcome to the Global Symposium for Regulators, GSR23, which is happening in Shamolshake in Egypt, where I'm very pleased to be joined in the studio now. I'm Mr Mario Manovich, who is the Director of the Radio Communication Bureau for ITU. Mario, it's great to have you in the studio. My pleasure. Now, in fact, last time we were here together was at the World Radio Communication Conference, actually, which is happening again this year. We'll come back to that in a little moment. But I wanted to ask you, you're here. Obviously, you're taking the time to be here at GSR as well and your radio communications as opposed to development. But there seems to be quite a lot of crossover. A lot of the conversations here are happening about spectrum. I wanted to find out what your impressions were of this particular event and why it's important for you to be here. And also, we could talk about the upcoming events as well. Well, the GSR continues to gather all the regulators around the world. So it is of utmost importance that we be here as regulators of the ultimate decision makers at the World Radio Communication Conference. But it's not only about the decisions in the conference itself. It's also about the way in which you regulate, in which you allocate spectrum in your countries, in which you manage that spectrum, in which you make it the best way possible for the benefit of the people and the citizens of the given country and around the world. So it's been very helpful to discuss with them these days. There has been a specific session on spectrum for the future, as you know. And it was an interesting discussion because obviously all the segments of the industry are pushing for their own needs for spectrum. But also, there was a good discussion about the regulators' priorities and what they should be focusing on in the future and not to forget the new topic about space sustainability that also has to do with spectrum and orbital resources. And this is a new topic that has added to the overall discussion, to the global discussion on this. Now, I know there's lots of preparatory meetings happening for WRC, but do you think this will kind of focus as well some of the conversations there? Well, at least it sensitizes the regulators on the issues that are at hand. Normally, the ones that attend the preparatory meetings for WRC are the technical people and more, let's say, focused on spectrum-related matters. But the regulators are the ones that are taking the political approaches. So it's important that they also be somehow sensitized on the importance of the decisions they are about to take. And there's also industry here as well. And a number of interesting conversations that are happening here as well. Absolutely. The industry is key in ITU, as you know, and we have them as members, differently from other UN organizations. And in particular, in the ITU, I mean, in the R sector, we need them. Most of the standards that we develop, most of the studies that we carry out in order to see spectrum compatibility and possibilities of sharing and all that are carried out with the help of the industry. And then they have to also own the results of the conference for them to be compliant and for them to be supportive. So they are a key player in our work, for sure. Now, I couldn't have you in the studio without allowing you to give a quick plug for the World Radio Communication Conference coming up. Perhaps you could tell our viewers or our listeners, depending if they're watching this as a video or listening to it as a podcast, what they could expect. Well, if they've been or they've learned about the WRC-19 here in Shamsheikh that you evoked at the beginning, WRC-23 is promising to be even larger with more participants than in 2019. We will have also great hosts this time, the United Arab Emirates and they are legendary for their capacity to host big meetings of the ITU and also to provide great hospitality for the participants. But regarding the content, it is as challenging or even more challenging than the one that we had in 2019. There are many controversial issues that are still not agreed upon. I think the COVID period wasn't very helpful in that regard because we had at least two years where discussions were limited to the online discussions. As you know, online discussions are all formal discussions. So, all the corridor talk and all the social interaction that leads to the compromising and to the agreement of solutions couldn't be made during those two years. So, we are short of time in order to make those happen. But this last year that we came back to normal meetings and people that are seeing each other again have proven to be very helpful and things have advanced. There is yet a lot to do for the conference. I trust that this month in the lead-up to the conference will continue to show progress in these topics but I'm sure that the conference itself will be a very hot one. Now, you're in your second term as radio communication director here. I just wanted to find out how has the year been so far for you? Well, you know, once you are re-elected, on one side you feel reconfortered by the trust of the membership and by the, let's say, recognition that what you've done in the first period was well done. But then in the R sector, in particular, you are put immediately on the run because the conference is coming. So, it's the next conference after the PP is the WRC. So, I didn't have much time to enjoy the results of the PP and I had to put my hands at work immediately for the conference. But I think that there were important improvements in the way the R sector works. In particular, one of my pillars for the first mandate and continues to be this time is to have more and more developing countries join the ITUR in their work and benefit from the work of the ITUR. So, in the past, as you know, there were very few of them and mostly developed countries that were part of the R sector activities. Now, there are more and more developing countries so the conversation has become global. It's for the benefit of all. And at the end of the day, what we are here to do in ITU is to connect everybody. So, that helps that objective. Absolutely. Well, Mario Menovic, thank you so much for joining us in the studio today and look forward to catching up with you again very soon. Absolutely, my pleasure. Thank you. Excellent. And do remember that we have plenty of interviews for GSR23 and others on our YouTube channel as well as our podcast channels as well. So, do check in on those. And if you've got needs for more information, go to www.itu.int. Thank you very much.