STATES PARTIES TO LAW OF SEA CONVENTION CONCLUDE TWELFTH MEETING, APPROVE $7.8 MILLION 2003 BUDGET FOR INTERNATIONAL TRIBUNAL

Meeting of States Parties

to Law of Sea Convention

70^th Meeting (AM)

STATES PARTIES TO LAW OF SEA CONVENTION CONCLUDE TWELFTH MEETING,

APPROVE $7.8 MILLION 2003 BUDGET FOR INTERNATIONAL TRIBUNAL

The States parties to the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea concluded their twelfth meeting this morning, approving a $7.8 million budget for the International Tribunal of the Law of the Sea for 2003.

With a view to providing the Tribunal a subsidiary body created under the Convention, with the necessary financial means to consider cases next year, in particular those requiring expeditious proceedings, the meeting further approved some $987,000 as contingency funds.  All States and international organizations that were parties to the Convention would finance both the budget and the contingency (contained in document SPLOS/L.27).

In a related decision, the States Members also decided to provide the Tribunal -- chiefly a dispute-settlement forum with exclusive jurisdiction in matters concerning deep seabed mineral resources -- with a financial “safety net” of $500,000, enabling that body to provide advisory opinions and examine cases in the event of temporary shortfalls in funds.  Those funds -- savings from 2001 to be appropriated to the Tribunal's Working Capital Fund -- would be made available on an exceptional basis, pending a yearly review based on the Tribunal’s burden of cases.

That decision was included in a text on miscellaneous budgetary matters of the International Tribunal (document SPLOS/L.28), orally amended by the President and the representatives of Nigeria and Cuba.  The text would ultimately authorize the Tribunal to transfer funds between appropriation sections when necessary to deal with cases that might arise during 2003. 

Also this morning the Meeting decided to formalize its decisions on the International Tribunal’s financial regulations at its thirteenth session next year.  President of the meeting, Don MacKay (New Zealand) presented a text of the Draft Financial Regulations of the Tribunal as an informal working paper, which could be formally approved once it had been translated into all languages.  The text reflected the Meeting’s decision that the euro would be the Tribunal’s currency of reference and that contributions might be paid in either United States dollars or euros.

Before the States parties concluded consideration of outstanding issues relating to the Tribunal’s financial arrangements, delegations returned to the issue of setting a new scale of assessments for contributions to its budget.  They had before them a proposal, presented by the representative of Japan, which aimed to reduce the ceiling on contributions at the same time as the budget, so that there would be no impact on individual payments.

In commenting on the proposal, some delegations, including Argentina, Germany and Brazil, noted that other nations besides Japan were suffering financial difficulties and that the reduced ceiling would benefit only the main contributors.  Others, including Mexico, Korea and the United States, questioned the inclusion of Tribunal "savings" in the proposal, and that the entire issue needed further discussion.  As no decision was reached on the matter, Japan requested that its proposal be kept on the table for further consideration.

When the meeting took up other open matters, Mr. MacKay drew attention to preparations for the upcoming commemoration of the twentieth anniversary of the Convention.  Presently, the intention was to hold the anniversary observance on   9 and 10 December.  It would include round tables and presentations by experts who had helped elaborate the treaty at the initial Conference on the Law of the Sea in 1982.  The events would coincide with the General Assembly’s annual examination of related matters.  He invited the States parties to give any further suggestions to the Bureau. 

The Russian Federation drew attention to a note verbale of Japan that had been circulated at the Meeting.  That note concerned Russia’s submission to the Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf on extending the country’s continental shelf jurisdiction.  He said bilateral consultations, mainly about technical discrepancies in the submission, were currently under way between the two countries.  Those consultations did not constitute a dispute, which was not properly reflected in the note.  The consultations were delicate, and distributing a political document at the Meeting was hardly conducive to constructive work.

Japan responded that there were indeed bilateral consultations under way on a technical matter in the submission from the Russian Federation.  The note had been distributed by his delegation for technical reasons, and did not represent an attempt to politicize the issue.

Summarizing the two-week session, Mr. MacKay noted that the Tribunal’s approved budget envisaged meetings for a total of 10 weeks in 2003 -- six to deal with anticipated judicial workload and four for administrative and other matters. He urged delegates to ensure that assessed contributions were paid on time and in full, so that the Tribunal could function effectively and efficiently.

Mr. MacKay said the elections of seven candidates to the Tribunal and 21 to the Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf were among the most important items on the agenda.  Another significant achievement was an agreement reached in the Working Group on Budgetary and Financial Matters on Financial Regulations of the Tribunal, which would go to the thirteenth Meeting of States parties for adoption.  He was also pleased that the Meeting had granted Observer Status to the Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf.

He also announced the tentative dates for the thirteenth meeting of States parties -- 9 to 13 June 2003.  He added that the fourth meeting of the Informal Consultative process on Ocean Affairs was tentatively scheduled to meet from 2 to 6 June 2003.

He proposed that the thirteenth Meeting should include the following agenda items: the Report of the International Tribunal for 2002; the draft budget of the Tribunal for 2004; the scale of assessments for contributions of States parties to

the budget of the Tribunal; adoption of the Financial Regulations of the Tribunal; the report of the External Auditors for 2001; issues with respect to Article 4 of Annex II to the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea; and matters related to article 319 of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea.

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