STATES PARTIES TO CONVENTION ON LAW OF SEA EXAMINE 2003 DRAFT BUDGET OF INTERNATIONAL TRIBUNAL

Meeting of States Parties

to Law of Sea Convention

62^nd Meeting (PM)

STATES PARTIES TO CONVENTION ON LAW OF SEA EXAMINE

2003 DRAFT BUDGET OF INTERNATIONAL TRIBUNAL

The States Parties to the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea met briefly this afternoon to consider the 2003 draft proposed budget of the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea.

Presenting the draft budget (document SPLOS/WP.16), Tribunal President

P. Chandrasekhara Rao said it totaled $7.8 million, which represented zero growth over the 2002 budget.  Increases were being sought for contingency judges, judges' pensions, the premises and the library as well as for general temporary assistance.

He said five judges would be eligible for pension in 2002 if they were not reelected.  Provision had also been made for four judges to retire in 2002, and for pensions already being paid.

The seventh Meeting had decided to appropriate $60,000 per year to equip the library, he continued.  Also, a new post of archivist at the P2 level was proposed for 2003.  Since 1966, the library had produced many archival documents, and a system was needed to maintain them.

[The Tribunal’s 2003 budgetary requirements are determined by the anticipated judicial workload, the Tribunal’s administrative work and the operation of its premises.  The budget proposal includes a total provision for the remuneration and allowances of judges, including their pensions and travel, in the amount of $2,704,600.  That figure includes $808,600 to meet expenditures related to cases.]

After Judge Rao's presentation, the Chairman of the Meeting of States Parties to the Convention, Don MacKay of New Zealand, proposed that further discussion of the budget take place in working group format.

Before the States Parties began their informal consultations, Philip Gautier, Registrar of the Tribunal, briefly drew the attention of delegations to three relevant working papers that would facilitate the discussions.  Those documents covered the question of savings from the previous Tribunal (document SPLOS/WP.18); the Staff Assessment Account of the Tribunal (document SPLOS/WP.19); and a draft decision on budgetary matters (document SPLOS/WP.20).

Work began this afternoon with a commendatory declaration from the representative of Fiji -- first State Party to the Convention.  Fijian representative Amraiya Naidu noted that the twentieth anniversary of the Convention also marked the twentieth anniversary of Fiji’s ratification of that

62^nd Meeting (PM)

important instrument.  He stressed that more was needed to ensure the Convention’s full implementation, so that all States Parties and non-parties were properly guided to meet the many challenges that sustainable and equitable management of oceans and seas would always present.

Adopted on 10 December 1982, the Convention represents an unprecedented attempt to regulate a range of maritime issues from navigational rights and territorial limits to management of marine resources and protection of the sea's environment.  There are presently 138 parties to the Convention, comprising 137 States and one entity, the European Union.

The International Tribunal, established by the Convention, is a forum to which parties may submit their disputes for settlement.  It has exclusive jurisdiction in disputes concerning deep seabed mineral resources, provides advisory opinions, and may be called upon to prescribe injunctive relief or provisional measures before a case or dispute is decided on merits.

The Tribunal’s injunctive and provisional measures have been directed at cases involving the detention of vessels and their crew.  The Tribunal is seated in Hamburg, Germany, and is composed of 21 members (judges) elected to nine-year terms.   

The States Parties to the Convention on the Law of the Sea will meet again tomorrow at 10:30 a.m., when they will hear an oral report of the International Seabed Authority and take up consideration of the observer status of the Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf.

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