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First session
Montreal, 29 June-3 July 1998
Item 4 of the provisional agenda

PREPARATION OF AN INTERNATIONAL LEGALLY BINDING INSTRUMENT
FOR IMPLEMENTING INTERNATIONAL ACTION ON CERTAIN
PERSISTENT ORGANIC POLLUTANTS

Proceedings of the regional and subregional awareness-raising
workshops on persistent organic pollutants

1. To alert national contact points to key scientific and policy issues related to persistent organic pollutants (POPs) and to help prepare them for the negotiations of an international legally binding instrument on POPs, the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) and the Intergovernmental Forum on Chemicals Safety jointly conducted regional and subregional POPs awareness-raising workshops for developing countries and countries with economies in transition. By the opening of the first session of the Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee, workshops will have been held in the following cities:

(a) St. Petersburg, Russia, 1-4 July 1997, for the new independent States;

(b) Bangkok, Thailand, 25-28 November 1997, for Asian and Pacific countries;

(c) Bamako, Mali, 15-18 December 1997, for francophone African countries;

(d) Cartagena, Colombia, 27-30 January 1998, for Central American and Caribbean countries;

(e) Lusaka, Zambia, 17-20 March 1998, for anglophone African countries;

(f) Iguazu, Argentina, 1-3 April 1998, for countries of the southern cone and Bolivia:

(g) Ljubljana, Slovenia, 11-14 May 1998, for Central and Eastern European countries; and

(h) Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates, 7-9 June 1998, for West Asian countries.

2. Proceedings from these workshops will be available from 29 June 1998. Copies can be obtained during the first session of the Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee, at the publication display area located in the meeting facility. The proceedings will also be available on the Internet at the global POPs homepage: http://irptc.unep.ch/pops, or upon request from the POPs team at UNEP Chemicals, at the following address:

15, chemin des Anémones,
CH-1219 Châtelaine, Geneva,
Switzerland.

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