Wrap-up Session of Working Groups, 27-04-07, ALG

The President of the Human Rights Council, Ambassador De Alba, chaired the closing conference of the first stage of the institution building process.
He announced that the second stage of this process will consist on several informal consultations which will begin next Monday, the 30th of April 2007.

These informal consultations will be based on a list that the President of the Human Rights Council will establish. This list is not meant to be exhaustive, but it is intended to be short, appointing the fundamental issues to be discussed.
The list will be constituted according to the main issues that the facilitators identify as requiring some further discussion.

The informal consultations will be held through bilateral negotiations (the President will talk to each member of the Human Rights Council and to several non-members) and through regional meetings.
In addition to these informal consultations in small groups, there will be three open-ended session, namely on the 10th, 18th and 24th of May 2007.
The aim is to conclude the institutional building process by the 18th of June 2007, that is to say, by the beginning of the 5th Session of the Human Rights Council.

After the presentation of the next stage in the institutional building process, each facilitator made a short summary on the work made by now and enumerated the issues which have not reached an agreement yet.
Up-dated non-papers on each Working Group were distributed, which will be a basis for the list of issues to be discussed in the informal consultations.

In the end, several ambassadors expressed their will to work in a constructive manner and stressed the importance of transparency, pragmatism and a consensus. They thanked for the work done by the President and the facilitators and demonstrated some optimism regarding the delay of the 18th of June 2007.