Havana, 13th December, 1996

The Ministerial Council:

Article XI (l) and (4) of the Convention establishing the ACS;

Article 39 of the Norms and Procedures governing the Ministerial Council, and

That at the Second Meeting of Senior Officials of the Association of Caribbean States, some countries expressed concern about the rotation of the Chairmanship of the Ministerial Council;

That, as a result, at the said Meeting the Secretary General was asked to submit a proposal for the rotation of the chairmanship of the Ministerial Council;

That the rotation of the Chairmanship of the Counicl of Ministers must take into account the nature of the Convention establishing the ACS with regard to geographical and linguistic representation within the Association;

That the Executive Body of the Ministerial Council should be constituted;

1. To suspend the application of Article 31 of the Norms and Procedures governing the Ministerial Council for a term of three (3) years (1996-1999) the latter included.

2. To adopt a transitory mechanism during that period for selecting the Executive Body of the Ministerial Council, consisting in a rotation of the positions in the Executive Body.

For the election of the Chairman, the groups will be as follows:

First Group: Antigua and Barbuda, Barbados, Bahamas, Belize, Dominica, Grenada, Guyana, Jamaica, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Saint Lucia, Suriname and Trinidad and Tobago.

Second Group: Colombia, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala. Honduras, Nicaragua.

Third Group: Cuba, Haiti, Mexico, Panama, the Dominican Republic and Venezuela.

Each group will successively hold the Chairmanship of the Executive Body of the Ministerial Council.

Each one of the groups will decide internally the country that will fill that post. The Executive Body appointed at the end of a session of the Ministerial Council will be in office until the next session.

3. During the last year of the transition period mentioned in paragraph 1 of this Agreement, the Ministerial Council will establish a mechanism to be implemented in connection with Article 31 of the Norms and Procedures.