Conference of Plenipotentiaries on the Emergency Protocol to the Barcelona Convention

The Government of Malta is hosting the Conference of Plenipotentiaries on the Protocol concerning Cooperation in Preventing Pollution from Ships and in Combating Pollution of the Mediterranean Sea by Oil and Hazardous and Noxious Substances in Cases of Emergency. This Conference, which is being organised by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), will convene on Thursday, 24 January 2002 at the Le Meridien Phoenicia Hotel. The Minister for the Environment, Dr Francis Zammit Dimech and the Coordinator of MAP M. Lucien Chabason, representing the Executive Director of UNEP, will make the opening statements. The Conference will examine and adopt the Draft Protocol.

The signature of the Final Act and Protocol will take place at the Presidential Palace in Valletta, on Friday, 25 January 2002. After the signing ceremony, the President of the Republic H.E. Professor Guido de Marco will meet the delegates attending the conference at the Palace.

The Conference of Plenipotentiaries will be preceded by a Third Meeting of National Legal and Technical Experts on the Revision of the Protocol which will convene also at the Le Meridien Phoenecia Hotel, from the 20-22 January 2002.

Representatives from 21 countries bordering the Mediterranean Sea and from the International Maritime Organisation (IMO) and from the MIO ECSDE are taking part in the Conference.