Regional Committee Meetings for each of WHO's six regions will take place consecutively between August 30 and October 6.
These meetings are an excellent opportunity to directly educategovernments representatives, including Health Ministers, about the importance of ratifing the FCTC.
Those NGO's in an official relationship with the WHO can attend and participate in these meetings.
An open ended intergovernmental working group, which was referred to in the WHA, resolution on the FCTC took place June 21-25, 2004, in Geneva, Switzerland. Visit http://www.who.int/gb/fctc/ for more information. ASH will provided coordination and leadership to other non-governmental organizations during this international WHO meeting.
The FCTC was adopted at the World Health Assembly in Geneva May 19
through May 30, 2003.
The last and final round of negotiations INB6 took place in Geneva,
Switzerland. From February 17th through February 28th, 2003.
In May 1996, the World Health Assembly (WHA) called on the Director
General of the WHO to initiate the development of the FCTC.
A body with the capacity to act as a secretariat to the Convention
- the Tobacco Free Initiative - was established at WHO in the summer
of 1998.
In May 1999, the World Health Assembly established an FCTC Working
Group, open to all member states, to begin preliminary work on drafting
possible components of the Framework Convention and possible protocols.
The first meeting of the Working Group was held in Geneva in October
1999 and the second meeting in March 2000.
The Working Group presented its work to the World Health Assembly
in May 2000.
Intergovernmental negotiations commenced in October 2000 at what was
called the first session of the Intergovernmental Negotiating
Body, which took place from 16 October to 21 October 2001.
A second round on negotiations took place from 30 April to 5
May 2001 at the second session of the Intergovernmental Negotiating
Body.
The third and last round of negotiations took place in Geneva from
November 22 to November 28, 2001.
The positions and proposals presented by governments during the second
round of talks had been incorporated in a revised draft text called
the 'Co-Chairs
draft'. The draft for the FCTC included a wide range of amendments
for discussion during INB3.
AFRO: 2002 A pre meeting was held from February 23-25 and the AFRO
regional meeting proper took place from the 26th February to 1st March.
The meetings was held in Abidjan, Ivory Coast.
EMRO: Held in March 2002 (March 2 to March 4) (before the annual meeting
of Arab Ministers of Health) in Cairo, Egypt.
PAHO: It had been suggested at INB3 that Latin American and Caribbean
countries would meet in Peru or Mexico between INB3 and 4 however this
seems in doubt at the moment. Mexico has offered to host a meeting between
INB4 and 5.
SEARO: 2002 A SEARO regional meeting was held in Jaipur, India, from
the 13th to15th of February.
ASEAN: An inter-sessional meeting of ASEAN countries (plus one or
more invitees from northern WPRO, possibly Mongolia) will be held in
Penang from the 4th to the 6th of March.
EURO: 2002 A regioanl meeting was held in EURO Warsaw Poland from
the 18-19 February.
Caribean: 2002 March 4 to March 5 in Lima, Peru.
Latin American & Caribbean March 6 and 7 in Lima Peru 2002
Presented as a public service by Action on Smoking and Health (ASH),
2013 H Street, N.W., Wash., DC 20006, USA, (202) 659-4310.
ASH is a 36-year-old national legal-action antismoking and nonsmokers'
rights organization which is entirely
supported by tax-deductible contributions.
Please credit ASH, and include ASH's web address: http://ash.org
