Summary

  • The NRO published Version 3 of the Governance Document for the Recognition, Operation, and Derecognition of Regional Internet Registries, dated 1 September 2026 and marked FINAL DRAFT; the authoritative PDF is internally labelled Version 3.4 (ASO AC Final Draft), and NRO states the PDF controls in case of discrepancy. [1]
  • Article 3 sets out a six-criterion entry test, a Proposal → RIR Recognition Assessments → ICANN Review pipeline, a modification procedure, and a Section 3.7 rule under which ICANN may not recognize a Candidate RIR without a Proposal supported by at least two-thirds of the RIRs submitting Recognition Assessments. [1][3]
  • Each incumbent RIR reviews the Proposal independently and must assess the candidate's good character, legal cooperability, conflicts of interest, and impact on its own Service Region and revenue — a structural conflict the draft acknowledges through disclosure requirements rather than removing it. [3]
  • The two-thirds threshold operates as a power-partition device: it caps ICANN's discretion while handing incumbents an effective collective veto, softened only by a narrow exclusion mechanism for materially impacted RIRs. [1]
  • Nothing in Article 3 is operative law yet. The document is a recommended draft awaiting Q4 2026 approval, and every conclusion here is anticipatory. [2]

The draft Governance Document succeeds Internet Coordination Policy-2 (ICP-2), the 4 June 2001 document that has governed the establishment of new RIRs for a quarter of a century. [1] The revision was led by the NRO Number Council — the same body as the ASO Address Council — in consultation with the RIR and ICANN communities, and it arrives after a process that began in November 2023: principles drafting, two community consultations (14 April–27 May 2025 and 28 August–7 November 2025), and drafting workshops in Montevideo, at ICANN 85 in Mumbai in March 2026, and at ICANN 86 in Seville in June 2026.

The ASO AC delivered the recommended document to the NRO EC on 28 July 2026, with approval and adoption scheduled for Q4 2026. [2]

Who may exist: the six criteria of Section 3.1

Section 3.1 provides that a Candidate RIR "cannot be Recognized unless it demonstrates" six things, to the satisfaction of the existing RIRs and ICANN. [1] A redline against Version 2 shows that the final draft tightened this wording: the redline PDF and the LACNIC-mirrored copy read "cannot be Recognized unless it demonstrates the following in its Proposal for Recognition", anchoring the criteria to the candidate's own written submission rather than to free-floating demonstrations. [8]

The six criteria are cumulative, not alternative:

  1. Regional qualification. The candidate must satisfy Section 2.2's definition of a Regional Internet Registry: a geographically continuous service region of substantial scale, spanning many distinct jurisdictions, with no overlap with any existing RIR's region.
  2. Resource holder support, including financial support and active participation of resource holders in the candidate's governance.
  3. Community support, including active participation in the candidate's Policy Development Process.
  4. Operational capability to meet the Section 4.1 requirements.
  5. No negative impact on the Internet Numbers Registry System or on existing RIRs' compliance with their own obligations.
  6. Material improvement to the functioning of the Internet Numbers Registry System.

The cumulative structure matters. Criterion (e) in particular gives every incumbent RIR a textual hook: any candidate whose recognition could plausibly affect an incumbent's compliance position — which is nearly any candidate — trips the test. Criterion (f), "material improvement," is a merit gate with no defined metric, leaving the assessors substantial interpretive room.

Section 2.3 supplies the frame for how generous this gate is likely to be in practice: the number of RIRs is "expected to remain small, consistent with technical and operational needs." [1] The document thereby declares, before any candidate applies, that scarcity of admission is the design default.

The pipeline: Proposal, RIR Assessments, ICANN Review

Section 3.2 requires a written Proposal for Recognition submitted to the RIRs and to ICANN, demonstrating each Section 3.1 criterion; both ICANN and the RIRs must publish notice that a Proposal was received. [1] Publication at the intake stage is a genuine transparency feature: a candidate cannot be quietly considered.

Section 3.3 then obliges each RIR independently to consider the Proposal. The RIR may make inquiries and conduct due diligence and must assess not only the six criteria but also the good character and integrity of the candidate and its Governing Body members — the draft's example is persons never convicted of an offence involving dishonesty, fraud or misrepresentation — and the candidate's "legal cooperability." Each RIR submits a Recognition Assessment containing its recommendation and reasons, the questions it posed and the responses received, and conflict-of-interest disclosures covering impact on its own Service Region and revenue, membership voting composition, and Policy Development Process participation. [3]

Section 3.4 puts ICANN in the reviewer's chair over the reviewers: ICANN must publish the Proposal and the Recognition Assessments (with possible redaction after consulting the RIRs), review each assessment, may ask an RIR to reconsider with rationale — the RIR must then modify or reaffirm its assessment and give reasons, which ICANN publishes — and reviews the Proposal against the criteria. [1]

Section 3.5 permits ICANN or any RIR to suggest modifications that the candidate may accept or reject; a materially modified Proposal restarts the Article 3 process unless the RIRs, the Candidate RIR and ICANN all agree otherwise. [1] This is a quiet but significant lever: an RIR dissatisfied with a candidacy can propose modifications knowing that material changes reset the clock.

Section 3.6 requires ICANN to decide: on approval, a Notice of Decision with reasons plus a Notice of Pending Recognition with a Transition Plan; on rejection, a published Notice of Decision explaining why. [3]

Section 3.8 defines the effects of recognition: the new RIR becomes responsible for providing RIR Services to its specified Service Region per the Transition Plan, joins the NRO, and becomes subject to the Governance Document. [1]

The gate: Section 3.7's two-thirds rule

The decisive constraint sits in Section 3.7: ICANN may not Recognize a Candidate RIR unless it has received a Proposal supported by at least two-thirds of the RIRs submitting Recognition Assessments. [1] With five incumbent RIRs, that means at least four positive assessments — unanimity is not required, but near-unanimity is.

The draft softens this with an exclusion mechanism: ICANN may exclude the negative recommendation of any RIR whose Service Region or revenue would be materially impacted by recognition, but only after written notice, reasoning, a materiality finding, and an opportunity for the RIR to respond; the excluded RIR's input is still considered on an informational basis. [1] This is a conflict-of-interest carve-out — an RIR whose territory a candidate would serve has an obvious incentive to block it — but it runs in the opposite direction from the structural conflict it addresses.

The RIR with the strongest reasons to object is the one whose objection can be set aside; the RIRs with no direct stake, whose objections need no materiality justification, retain unexcludable weight.

NRO's own summary of differences confirms that Version 3 deliberately restructured the recognition process around "more detailed proposal and review requirements, a two-thirds RIR support threshold, conflict-of-interest disclosure, clearer ICANN responsibilities, and greater transparency through publication of assessments and rationales," alongside a revised audit and compliance framework and a more detailed derecognition process. [4]

A LACNIC-hosted mirror of the Version 3.4 PDF corroborates the NRO text for Sections 3.1–3.4 and 3.8 and confirms the document runs to 19 pages. [5]

Sources: [1] NRO, RIR Governance Document Version 3; [2] NRO, Process for the Review of ICP-2 and Timeline; [3] NRO, Governance Document Version 3.4 (ASO AC Final Draft) PDF; [4] NRO, Summary of Differences and Rationale for Changes; [5] LACNIC-mirrored Version 3.4 PDF; [6] NRO, Recommended Draft Rationale Report and Next Steps; [7] NRO, ICP-2 FAQ; [8] NRO, Version 3 redline PDF.