Like all other European countries with a historic and cultural tradition, Spain contributed to the birth and evolution of humanitarian law as applied to war. Its contribution, like that of every country, had certain special aspects striking a characteristic note in the composition as a whole and anticipating what were later to become generally applicable provisions.

The ever more frequent use of medical helicopters and aircraft by military and civilian organizations of modern nations to give first-aid to the wounded and have them transported has also led the central bodies of various National Red Cross Societies to add the most up-to-date and fastest methods of air transport to the traditional forms of transportation.

We have the honour to inform you that the International Committee of the Red Cross on December 8, 1966, granted recognition to the Zambia Red Cross Society.

The International Committee of the Red Cross has continued its exchange of correspondence with the Government of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam on various humanitarian problems raised by the present conflict. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Hanoi has declared that it could not accept the proposal made by the United States to hold a conference in order to examine ways of applying the Geneva Conventions, a proposal which had been transmitted by the ICRC. The same ministry has acknowledged receiving various communications from the ICRC, in particular the nominal roll of 19 North Vietnamese seamen captured by the US Navy in the Gulf of Tonkin and the two reports drawn up following on visits made to these seamen by ICRC delegates.

Mr. Guillaume Bordier will continue as Vice-President of the International Committee in 1967 ; Mr. Frédéric Siordet has been appointed Vice-President for 1967 and 1968.

Miss Alice Girard, President, and Miss Helen Nussbaum, Executive Director of the International Council of Nurses, the central headquarters of which have been transferred to Geneva once again, paid a visit to the International Committee of the Red Cross.

On December 22, 1966, took place the by now traditional ceremony at which the International Committee presents a token of gratitude to personnel having twenty years of service to then credit. This year there were three such staff members to whom Mr. S. A. Gonard, President, expressed the institution's appreciation for their zeal and loyalty to the Red Cross. He presented each of them with a silver platter on which the recipient's name was engraved.

In 1937, during the Spanish Civil War, young A. H. S., who was born in Bilbao in 1929, went to the USSR.