A/HRC/12/47 page 4 I. INTRODUCTION 1. Annual meetings of special rapporteurs/representatives, experts and chairpersons of working groups of the special procedures of the Commission on Human Rights and the Human Rights Council have been held since 1994. The Vienna Declaration and Programme of Action adopted by the World Conference on Human Rights on 25 June 1993 underlined the importance of preserving and strengthening the system of special procedures and specified that the procedures and mechanisms should be enabled to harmonize and rationalize their work through periodic meetings (A/CONF.157/24 (part II), para. 95). 2. The sixteenth annual meeting of special procedures was convened in Geneva from 29 June to 3 July 2009. It had before it a provisional annotated agenda and documents prepared by mandate holders, the Secretariat and other sources. 3. During the meeting, the mandate holders held exchanges of views with the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, the President of the Human Rights Council and members of the Bureau, and the former President of the Council. Participants held a joint meeting with participants attending the twenty-first meeting of persons chairing the human rights treaty bodies, and had exchanges of views with the Chair of the Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, the Special Representative of the Secretary-General on violence against children and the Special Adviser to the Secretary-General on the Prevention of Genocide. They met with representatives of non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and national human rights institutions (NHRIs). II. ORGANIZATION OF WORK 4. The meeting was opened by Asma Jahangir, Chairperson of the fifteenth annual meeting and Chair of the Coordination Committee (hereafter “the Committee”) of special procedures. 5. Santiago Corcuera was elected Chair of the sixteenth annual meeting and of the Committee and Najat M’jid Maalla as Rapporteur of the meeting and a member of the Committee. The three remaining members elected by consensus to the Committee on 1 July were Joy Ngozi Ezeilo, Frank William La Rue Lewy and Manfred Nowak. Ms. Jahangir would continue as an ex officio member of the Committee during the next year. 6. Participants expressed deep appreciation for the work carried out throughout the year by the outgoing Chairperson and the other members of the Committee, in particular in connection with the process of the review of mandates conducted by the Council, the selection of new mandate holders and the coordinated approach to human rights situations of concern. The outgoing Chair also thanked the Special Procedures Division of the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) for its support to the Committee and for keeping mandate holders informed about Council developments throughout the year. Mandate holders approved the agenda. 7. Outside the formal agenda of the meeting, a briefing for mandate holders was organized by the research director of a project on the impact of United Nations human rights mechanisms on