Statement to the 71st Ordinary Session of the Council of Ministers

"I wish to share with Council, my concern over the poor state of the financial situation of our Organization. In a development which has considerably reversed the progress we made in the past few years, the level of cumulative arrears for our budget has increased substantially and the trend towards delayed payments seems unfortunately, to persist. In this respect, while we are now in the eighth month of the current financial year, hardly a third of the Member States have paid their assessed contributions in full as the report of the Committee of Ambassadors has shown." - Dr. Salim, March 8, 2000