A/HRC/4/31 page 10 in order to provide an orderly, ethical and acceptable framework for regulating the acquisition and transplantation of human organs for therapeutic purposes.2 In such cases, the protection of minors could be assured by requiring the minor’s comprehending consent and the consent of the parent or the legal guardian. Guiding principle 4 provides absolute prohibition of the removal of organs from legal minors, exception in the case of regenerative tissues. It adds in guiding principle 5 that no human body or parts can be the subject of commercial transactions, neither compensations nor rewards. Finally, guiding principle 7 prohibits physicians and other health professionals from engaging in organ transplantation procedures if they have reason to believe that the organs concerned have been the subject of commercial transactions. 33. In response to a request of the Government of Colombia, the Ethics Department and the Department of Essential Health Technologies of WHO undertook a study on the issue. The report was accepted by the Executive Board and, after several amendments, the fifty-seventh World Health Assembly adopted a resolution in May 2004, that urged the member States to take measures to protect the poorest and most vulnerable groups from “transplant tourism” and the sale of tissues and organs, including by giving attention to the wider problem of international trafficking in human organs.3 34. On 20 December 2004, the General Assembly of the United Nations, in its resolution 59/156, also made a recommendation on the issue of illicit removal and trafficking of human organs.4 It requested the Eleventh United Nations Congress on Crime Prevention and Criminal Justice to prepare a study on the extent of the phenomenon for submission at its fifteenth session. 35. The United Nations Office on Drug and Crime (UNODC) has also contributed on this matter, through its Terrorism, Corruption and Human Trafficking division. According to UNODC, trafficking in human beings (including the removal of organs) is a global issue, and there is a need to strengthen the criminal justice response to trafficking through legislative reform, awareness-raising and training, as well as national and international cooperation. Thus, the Global Programme against Trafficking in Human Beings (GPAT) was launched in March 1999 with its main objective being to bring to the foreground the involvement of organized criminal groups on that issue. Its key components are data collection, assessment and technical cooperation. Pursuant to that aim, a report was issued in April 2006 entitled “Global Patterns”, which constitutes an analysis of human trafficking data collected from 1996 to 2003 that shows patterns at the global, regional and national levels. 36. Moreover, several countries are involved in technical cooperation projects and specific intervention measures are introduced to strengthen the capacity to combat forms of trafficking. At the national levels, the programme helps, for example, to promote awareness-raising by public campaigns, to train law-enforcement officers, prosecutors and judges or to strengthen victim and witness support. For example, in the West African region, a project is currently under implementation covering Benin, Togo, and Nigeria. With support from Canada, France and Norway, the project carries out an assessment of human trafficking trends. Training for criminal justice practitioners was provided in February-March 2004 focusing on the investigation and prosecution of human trafficking as well as international cooperation. On an