At the October 1975 meeting of the Council of Delegates of the National Red Cross Societies in Geneva, Professor H. Haug, President of the Swiss Red Cross and Vice-President of the League, had proposed that a declaration should be drawn up, setting out in a condensed form the fundamental rules of humanitarian law, and rendering the lofty ideas underlying humanitarian law clearly discernible and easily understandable.

The Constitution Revision Commission, noting some confusion in the Constitution then in force concerning the power and functions of the League's two most important bodies, the Board of Governors and the Executive Committee, was predominantly concerned with adapting the structure to the specific character of the organization as the international federation of National Societies, and to ensure the greatest possible participation by National Red Cross Societies in the work of the organization by reinforcing the functions of its collective bodies. The Commission also wished to limit the duration of mandates in the organization and to make a rigorous distinction between the functions of the different bodies of the federation.

The ICRC and the League share, to a very great extent, the Tansley Report opinions on this important question. Naturally, the planning for relief actions diifers in some respects according to whether it is related to natural disasters or to armed conflicts. However, there are important common elements in this planning which merit development and joint study by the ICRC and the League.

The events in Lebanon and the despatch of a UN armed force to keep the peace there brings into focus a problem which cannot be ignored, the application of international humanitarian law in armed conflicts. This problem has two aspects:

— What is the nature of the armed forces which the UN commits or can commit at the present time?

— To what extent are these armed forces obliged to apply humanitarian law?

After the Republic of Ghana, the first State to ratify, in February 1978, the two Protocols additional to the Geneva Conventions of 12 August 1949, the Socialist People's Libyan Arab Jamahiriya, on 7 June 1978, deposited with the Swiss Government its instrument of accession to Protocols I and II.

In a letter which reached the President of the Swiss Confederation on 13 April 1978, the Kingdom of Tonga declared that it considered itself bound by the four Geneva Conventions of 12 August 1949 for the protection of war victims, by virtue of the prior ratification of the Conventions by the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.

At its meeting on 6 July, the ICRC Assembly appointed to the Executive Board, for a term of office expiring at the end of 1980, Mr. Jakob Burckhardt, who has been a member of the Assembly since 1975. By closely associating him in its activity, the ICRC will benefit more regularly from his wide experience.

The ICRC recently sent two missions to southern Africa, as part of its campaign to make its activities better known and to promote humanitarian principles in the regions where conflicts have been taking place.