IOM holds its Council 103^rd session from 26 to 29 of November in Geneva. The IOM Council gathered together delegations from around 100 member-states, observers, international organizations and nongovernmental institutions (UNHCR, Council of Europe, WHO, ILO, ICRC, IOF, World Bank etc.)

At the opening of the session the Director General of the IOM W. Swing delivered a speech during which he reminded delegates of the main strategic objectives of the Organization, as well as the main challenges that Organization has to face. He also informed the members of the Council about the main priorities of the Organization, which are to increase the number of IOM member-states, create more partnerships, develop staff professionalism, insure core budget stability, maintain the leading role of IOM as a Migration agency, build a more representative IOM, enrich the migration narrative with the concept of human mobility, review by member-states of the IOM-UN relationship.

On the first day of this session Turkmenistan, Republic of Iceland, Fiji and Republic of the Marshall Islands have been accepted as IOM members. Their admission increased IOM membership from 151 countries to 155. IOM Council has approved the Programme and Budget for 2014.

At the general debate the main attention will be focused on the important issues of protection of migrants’ rights, achievements of individual countries to combat illegal migration, the current status of the Organization and proposals of the delegations on how it can be further strengthened.