page 4 (o) Monitoring more effectively the human rights of women in their activities, integrating a gender perspective throughout their work and assessing the effectiveness of those efforts; 4. Welcomes the holding of inter-committee meetings of human rights treaty bodies twice annually to discuss issues of common concern, including improving and further harmonizing the methods of work of the treaty bodies, and encourages those bodies to continue this practice; 5. Also welcomes the holding of regular meetings of treaty bodies with States parties, and encourages the treaty bodies to continue this practice; 6. Further welcomes the contribution to the work of the human rights treaty bodies made by other United Nations bodies, and encourages the specialized agencies, funds and programmes, other United Nations bodies, the various organs of the Council, including its special procedures, the Advisory Committee, the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights and the chairpersons of the human rights treaty bodies to continue to intensify this cooperation and improve communication and information flow to improve further the quality of their work, including by avoiding unnecessary duplication; 7. Welcomes the launch of the universal periodic review of the Council, which shall complement and not duplicate the work of the treaty bodies, and the potential of this mechanism to contribute to the ratification and to promote the implementation of the human rights treaties, including follow-up to the recommendations of the treaty bodies; 8. Urges States to: (a) Consider signing and ratifying or acceding to the international human rights instruments and to consider accepting the individual communications procedures under applicable instruments if they have not already done so, and to effectively implement their obligations under instruments to which they are party; (b) Make every effort to meet their reporting obligations under United Nations human rights instruments, in particular by submitting initial and overdue reports;