Informal lunch meeting for States from Middle East and surrounding regions

On 1 February 2012, the Director of the IOPC Funds hosted an informal lunch meeting for the London based representatives of States from the Middle East and surrounding regions.
Since 2009, the Secretariat has organised regular informal lunch meetings based on geographical regions which provide a valuable opportunity for both Member and non-Member States to visit the Secretariat and learn more about the work of the IOPC Funds.
This meeting, the 11th organised, was well attended with 13 guests representing 10 States. The London based representatives had the opportunity to ask questions and to exchange their views on various subjects such as the running of Funds’ meetings, oil reporting, the contributions system, incidents and claims handling and the status of the HNS Convention. During a welcoming statement, the Director was pleased to note that all of the States represented at the lunch were covered by the 1992 Civil Liability Convention and that 9 States had ratified the 1992 Fund Convention. He emphasised, however, the importance of ensuring that these legal instruments had been implemented into national law. He offered the assistance of the Secretariat should any of the States require additional support or further information on any aspect of international compensation regime.
A number of valuable new contacts were made during the meeting. Secretariat staff also took the opportunity to show the guests around the new Document Services website and helped them to register for email notifications of newly published documents. Guests were reminded that the next set of meetings would take place from 24 – 27 April 2012 and that all documents would be available to download via the new Document Services website.
The next regional lunch meeting is planned to be held in May 2012.