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Mr. Garel-Jones : I refer the hon. Gentleman to the answer I gave to the hon. Member for Halifax (Mrs. Mahon) on 28 April at column 440.

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Sustainable Development

Mr. Llew Smith : To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will make a statement on the work undertaken to date and the achievements of the United Nations inter-agency committee on sustainable development since its establishment.

Mr. Lennox-Boyd : The inter-agency committee on sustainable development held its first meeting in New York from 23 to 25 March. The committee agreed an approach for the allocation and sharing of responsibilities and for improved co-ordination in the implementation of Agenda 21 by the UN system ; reviewed subsidiary bodies ; discussed the financing needs of the UN system for activities mandated under Agenda 21 ; assessed new and existing reporting requirements related to Agenda 21 and made recommendations for their streamlining ; and discussed the current policy issues in the follow-up to Agenda 21 which would need to be addressed by the administrative committee on co-ordination.

Economic and Social Committee

Mr. Llew Smith : To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs how the United Kingdom is represented on the Economic and Social Committee of the United Nations ; and what environmental initiatives have been taken by ECOSOC since 1990.

Mr. Douglas Hogg : The United Kingdom has been a member of the Economic and Social Council of the United Nations (ECOSOC) since 1946. We were re-elected to serve a further four-year term at the 1992 General Assembly.

In February 1993 ECOSOC established the Commission for Sustainable Development which will review progress in implementing the agreements reached at the United Nations conference on environment and development in Rio in June 1992. Since 1990 ECOSOC has passed a number of resolutions on environmental issues which are listed in the following official UN documents :

Report of the Economic and Social Council for the year 1990 ; Report of the Economic and Social Council for the year 1991 ; Report of the Economic and Social Council

(preliminary version A/47/3 of 21 September 1992)

Resolutions and decisions adopted by the Economic and Social Council at its Organisational Session for 1993 E/1993/INF/2. These can be found in the Library of the House.

Adriatic Ship Diversions

Mr. Home Robertson : To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will publish a table showing the countries of registration and ownership, and the nature of the cargo, of the vessels diverted to date by North Atlantic Treaty Organisation and Western European Union ships in the Adriatic.

Mr. Garel-Jones : From 22 November 1992 to 21 April 1993 NATO and Western European Union ships in the Adriatic challenged a total of 9, 396 vessels, of which 599 were boarded and 137 diverted for closer inspection. We are investigating with the relevant authorities whether a list of the countries of registration and ownership of the diverted vessels, and of the cargoes carried by them, is available for publication.

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Nuclear Non-proliferation

Dr. Reid : To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will make a statement about the Government's policy as regards the forthcoming non-proliferation treaty preparatory committee meeting.

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Mr. Douglas Hogg : The first preparatory committee will chiefly be concerned with procedural and administrative matters relating to the 1995 non-proliferation treaty extension and review conference. Our policy is to secure the indefinite extension of the treaty in 1995.

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