Foreign Names Committee

Transcription

1 U.S. Board on Geographic Names Foreign Names Committee Minutes of the 392 nd Meeting 12 December 2017 National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency Springfield, VA

2 The United States Board on Geographic Names Foreign Names Committee 392 nd Meeting December 12, 2017 National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency Springfield, Virginia Minutes 1. Opening At 1:12 p.m. EST, the Chair opened the 392 nd quarterly meeting of the Foreign Names Committee (FNC) by welcoming all participants and guests. Attendance Members: Leo DILLON, Chair and Member, Department of State Deputy Member, Central Intelligence Agency (World Factbook) Deputy Member, Department of Commerce (Census) Deputy Member, Department of Defense (NGA) Deputy Member, Department of Defense (NGA) Deputy Member, Department of Defense (NSA) Deputy Member, Department of State Deputy Member, Vice-Chair, Library of Congress Member, Central Intelligence Agency (Cartography Center) Member, Library of Congress Ex Officio: Trent PALMER, Executive Secretary for Foreign Names Tara WALLACE, BGN Vice-Chair FNC staff and guests The meeting agenda is at Attachment Approval of the Minutes of the 391 st FNC meeting The minutes of FNC 391 were approved, with amendments. 2

3 3. Critical Issues/ Policy Discussion 3.1 Name rank (Attachment 2) The Executive Secretary presented an information paper highlighting the ability to establish a name rank for features with more than one approved name. The issue of name rank most commonly appears in international features and in countries with multiple official languages. The Executive Secretary noted the potential value in documenting general guidance on name rank. This matter is anticipated to be a subject of discussion at the upcoming BGN/PCGN Conference in Oceans file update As a follow up to the Oceans file paper presented at FNC 390, the Executive Secretary and Chair reported on recent meetings with the East Asian and Pacific Affairs (EAP) Bureau at the U.S. Department of State. Together, they assembled an action memo seeking approval of the changes outlined in the FNC 390 paper, to be sent to the Acting Deputy Assistant Secretary at State. The Chair expects the changes will be approved. Due to the political sensitivity of some of these names, changes to the Oceans file will likely require messaging to some embassies. 3.3 Jerusalem (Attachment 3) In response to the 6 December 2017 announcement recognizing Jerusalem as Israel s capital, the Chair presented an information paper on the city and its current status in the GNDB/GNS. The city is currently recorded as a populated place (PPL) in No Man s Land (NM). The city has a conventional name (Jerusalem) along with approved Arabic and Hebrew names. The city s coordinates fall slightly east of the No Man s Land. The Chair fielded input from FNC members and staff on how to best show Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, while at the same time, still recognizing the international character of the wider city. One suggestion was to create a second feature that is a capital of a political entity (PPLC) with an Israel country code, with authoritative Hebrew and Arabic names, placed west of the 1949 Armistice Line. Another option is to keep the one existing feature, designate it as a PPLC and use the public note feature to explain that in its role as capital of Israel, the feature is a PPLC; in its role as a populated place, the feature is a PPL. It was suggested that the FNC provides several different options based on data that highlight that potential shortcomings of each solution. This matter will remain part of ongoing discussions. 4. BGN/PCGN Issues 4.1 Toponymic Exchange (Attachment 4) In September 2017, two FNC staff members travelled to London to participate in the BGN/PCGN Toponymic Exchange program. FNC staff had the opportunity to visit PCGN s office at the Royal Geographical Society, the Defense Geographic Centre, the British Library, and the Foreign and Commonwealth Office. Various UK partners noted their daily use and appreciation of the NGA GEOnet Names Server (GNS) nd BGN/PCGN Conference The 32 nd BGN/PCGN Conference is scheduled to be held in London the week of March Both the Chair and Executive Secretary encouraged FNC members and staff to participate by attending the conference and/or preparing papers for presentation. 5. Staff information reports and recommendations 5.1 France: Administrative divisions (Attachment 5) The recommendation to change the long form conventional and approved names for one existing first-order administrative division was approved. The changes will be reflected in the GNS after 1 January 2018 when Corse officially becomes a collectivité. 5.2 Japan: Conventional name (Attachment 6) The recommendation to add a conventional name to the island of Honshū was approved. This conventional name, along with others, was removed at FNC 209 but the decision was reversed at FNC 211. Mistakenly, Honshu was not restored at that time. 3

4 5.3 Japan: Names collection policy (Attachment 7) This information paper addressed names collection policy in the Russian-occupied, Japanese-claimed islands in the Kuril Islands chain. The paper provided guidance on country codes, first-order administrative divisions, natural features, administrative features, man-made features, inhabited features, and uninhabited features. 5.4 Japan/Russia: International feature name (Attachment 8) The proposed addition of a Japanese name for an international feature was approved. 5.5 Kazakhstan: Kazakh orthography (Attachment 9) This information paper outlined the proposed future Kazakh Latin alphabet that is to be adopted by There is evidence to suggest that the new Latin script is being implemented in some situations. These changes will have a considerable effect on the spelling of Kazakh toponyms. 5.6 New Caledonia (France): referendum on independence (Attachment 10) This information paper highlighted New Caledonia s upcoming independence referendum scheduled to take place at some point no later than November It is expected that New Caledonia will vote to remain a part of France. New Caledonia is currently listed in the GNS as a dependent political entity (PCLD) and contains three first-order administrative divisions (ADM1s). 5.7 Norway: Administrative divisions and seats (Attachment 11) On 1 January 2018, Norway will create a new first-order administrative division through the amalgamation of two existing first-order administrative divisions. The Committee approved the recommendation to reflect this change, along with downgrading the former first-order administrative seat of Trondheim to a populated place and designating Steinkjer as the seat of the newly created first-order administrative division. 5.8 Swaziland: Administrative divisions and seats (Attachment 12) The Committee approved the recommendation to change the generic associated with Swaziland s firstorder administrative divisions from district to region. The proposed changes to two seats of first-order administrative divisions were also approved. 5.9 Uganda: New administrative divisions (Attachment 13) The recommendation to add ten first-order administrative divisions and their seats was approved. 6. Country Policies 6.1 Finland (Attachment 14) The proposed country policy document was approved. 6.2 Nauru (Attachment 15) The proposed country policy document was approved. 6.3 Norway The proposed country policy document was presented for review. 6.4 Trinidad and Tobago (Attachment 16) The proposed country policy document was approved. 7. Foreign Names Staff Production Report (Attachment 17) The Foreign Names Staff Production Report was presented for the fourth quarter of FY

5 8. GENC Update (Attachment 18) The Executive Secretary shared an information paper detailing the role of the GENC as the US Government profile of the ISO 3166 country code standard. GENC content periodically changes when there are updates to ISO The paper annex enumerates recent changes made in the GENC Edition 3 Update 8 that are a result of notifications emanating from the ISO 3166 Online Browsing Platform (OBP). As of 30 September 2017, NGA has assumed full maintenance of the GENC Registry content. 9. Communications (Attachment 19) The Executive Secretary prepared a communications report with updates and a schedule of upcoming events. There is continuing progress on the BGN records project; all hard-copy Full Board, FNC, Executive Committee and Publicity Committee meeting minutes held by NGA have been scanned. The Executive Secretary also reports that there is a renewed effort to update the memorandum of understanding between BGN and NGA. Lastly, due to planned technical upgrades, there are anticipated multi-day GNS outages in late January The next DNC meeting is scheduled for 14 December 2017 at the Department of the Interior while the BGN Executive Committee meeting is scheduled for 4 January 2018 at the offices of NOAA. The next BGN Full Board meeting is scheduled to be held at the Department of the Interior on 16 January Finally, the Executive Secretary acknowledged the scheduling conflict with the upcoming FNC 393 (13 March 2018) and the 32 nd BGN/PCGN Conference in London (12-16 March 2018). The Chair suggested the FNC meeting be held around the first week of April, in order to allow enough time to prepare following the conference in London. The actual date of the meeting will be chosen at a later time. The Chair noted that the State Department had recently received a memo from the Republic of Korea Embassy asking that the US Government refrain from using South Korea in official US documents, preferring Republic of Korea. It was unclear whether this request only applies to documents like passports and birth certificates, or to mapping products as well. 9. FNC Agency Reports 9.1 Department of State Report At FNC 391, the Chair reported on the possibility of a request coming from State to change the name of the Pakistani administrative division of Azad Kashmir to Azad Jammu and Kashmir. Since then, the proposal has been rejected thus there will be no name change at this time. The Chair also mentioned that the Office of the Geographer and Global Issues held meetings with representatives from ESRI to discuss the possibility of building a web mapping interface to display US Government recognized boundaries and BGN approved toponyms. The project is unlikely to come to fruition in the near future as the availability of resources needed to build a base map and maintain the data is questionable. 9.2 CIA Report The CIA representative for the World Factbook provided the Committee with information that may lead to changes to the ADM1s of Niger and Nepal. In Niger, authoritative evidence suggests that Niamey is classified as a communauté urbaine. In Nepal, non-authoritative evidence seems to show that Nepal s ADM1s now have official names. 9.3 DIA Report Not present. 9.4 NGA Report Nothing to report. 5

6 9.5 NSA Report Nothing to report. 9.6 OSD Report Not present. 9.7 USACE Report Nothing to report. 9.8 Department of Commerce Report The Department of Commerce representative reported that they had found evidence that may necessitate a name change for one Libyan ADM1. The representative also asked where to direct other similar queries in the future. The NGA representative replied that members can send any queries or information to geonames@nga.mil. 9.9 Library of Congress (LOC) Report The LOC Deputy Member reported on recent revisions to the Azerbaijani romanization systems. As this was the Deputy Member s final FNC meeting, they announced their replacement on the board with a new member, along with the name of the LOC staff member who will take over cataloging ALC romanization systems. The LOC Member thanked all those who were able to attend GIS Day at the Library of Congress in November, making the event a success. 10. Other Business The Chair announced the retirement from Federal Service of the FNC Vice-Chair and deputy member representing the Library of Congress. The Committee recognized the Vice-Chair s service and dedication to the FNC. The new Library of Congress member will begin attending meetings in It was also announced that a long-serving FNC staff member would be retiring this month after 27 years. The staff member has an impressive list of accomplishments during their time at NGA, including authoring 17 FNC papers, teaching 16 toponymic training courses offered through PAIGH, and serving as a member of ACAN since The Chair offered the staff member a certificate in recognition of their service and many accomplishments. They will be greatly missed. 11. Closing The 393 rd FNC meeting is tentatively scheduled for early April The 392 nd FNC meeting was adjourned at 3:05 pm EST. 6