A/HRC/26/41 34. Another suggestion made by some States with regard to follow-up to the universal periodic review is that donor countries that provide foreign aid to other countries should tailor their programmes, at least in part, towards addressing specific review recommendations made to relevant recipient States. It is hoped that this will help create greater and much-needed synergy between international cooperation in the human rights field and international development efforts. 35. With regard to improvement of follow-up to recommendations of the treaty bodies, it has been suggested that there should be better coordinated and more inclusive follow-up procedures, and increased cooperation between States and those bodies. One possibility is the development of a specific inter-committee follow-up mechanism for all the treaty bodies.35 Cooperation is not limited to ratification, coordination or dialogue, but also concerns compliance with and follow-up on obligations. A monitoring body that would dedicate its entire resources to encouraging cooperation in the follow-up phases of the work of the treaty bodies would greatly enhance this goal. In this connection some reflection on putting existing bodies to use may be required. IX. Strengthening the voluntary funds 36. There are two funds at issue here: the Universal Periodic Review Voluntary Trust Fund established pursuant to Human Rights Council resolution 6/17 to facilitate the participation of developing countries, particularly least developed countries, in the universal periodic review mechanism; and the Voluntary Fund for Financial and Technical Assistance established pursuant to the same resolution to help, in conjunction with multilateral funding mechanisms, countries implement the recommendations emanating from the universal periodic review, in consultation with, and with the consent of, the country concerned. The contributions that those two funds have made, and can potentially make, to international cooperation in the field of human rights are not in doubt. There is in fact growing demand from States for access to the inadequate financial assistance available from the funds. One indicator of this trend is that, since early in 2013, OHCHR has reviewed more than 20 new requests from various countries for funding from the Voluntary Fund for Financial and Technical Assistance to support their implementation of review recommendations (see A/HRC/24/56, para.20). As at early in 2012, 67 requests were at various stages of being processed or being funded through the Universal Periodic Review Voluntary Trust Fund.36 37. It was against this background that the Human Rights Council, in paragraphs 14 and 19 of its resolution 16/21, called for the strengthening of the two funds. In that resolution the Council concluded that the Voluntary Fund for Financial and Technical Assistance should be strengthened and operationalized in order to provide a source of financial and technical assistance to help countries implement the recommendations emanating from their review. The Council also requested that the Universal Periodic Review Voluntary Trust Fund should be similarly strengthened and operationalized. 38. Despite the consensus in the Human Rights Council that both the funds need to be strengthened, there may not be universal agreement as to the exact measures to be taken in this regard. One proposal in respect of both funds is to find more systematic and assured ways of increasing the resources available to them. This is absolutely necessary given the rising and genuine demand for access to the resources of the two funds, the low incidence 35 36 14 Allehone Mulugeta Abebe, op.cit., p. 234. OHCHR, “Requests for financial assistance under the Voluntary Fund for participation in the UPR mechanism”, available at ww.ohchr.org/EN/HRBodies/UPR/Documents/VPUFinancialRequest.pdf.