A/RES/53/138 Page 5 17. Underlines the importance of providing technical assistance to a State, upon its request, in the process of ratifying human rights instruments and in the preparation of its initial reports; 18. Requests the Secretary-General to compile in a single volume all the general guidelines regarding the form and content of reports to be submitted by States parties that have been issued by the Human Rights Committee, the Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women, the Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, the Committee on the Rights of the Child and the Committee against Torture; 19. Reiterates its concern about the increasing backlog of reports on the implementation by States parties of certain United Nations instruments on human rights and about delays in consideration of reports by the treaty bodies; 20. Also reiterates its concern about the large number of overdue reports under the United Nations instruments on human rights, and again urges States parties to make every effort to meet their reporting obligations; 21. Invites States parties that have been unable to comply with the requirements to submit their initial report to avail themselves of technical assistance; 22. Urges all States parties whose reports have been examined by human rights treaty bodies to provide adequate follow-up to the observations and final comments of the treaty bodies on their reports; 23. Encourages the human rights treaty bodies to continue to identify specific possibilities for technical assistance, to be provided at the request of the State concerned, in the regular course of their work of reviewing the periodic reports of States parties; 24. Recalls the recommendation by the meeting of persons chairing the human rights treaty bodies that treaty bodies urge each State party to translate, publish and make widely available in its territory the full text of the concluding observations on its reports to the treaty bodies; 25. Welcomes the contribution to the work of the human rights treaty bodies made by the specialized agencies and other United Nations bodies, and invites the specialized agencies, other United Nations bodies and the treaty bodies to continue to pursue further cooperation between them; 26. Notes that efforts continue to be made at coordination and cooperation between the human rights treaty bodies and the special procedures, rapporteurs, representatives, experts and working groups of the Commission on Human Rights and the Subcommission on Prevention of Discrimination and Protection of Minorities of the Commission, all acting within their respective mandates; 27. Recognizes the important role played by non-governmental organizations in all parts of the world in the effective implementation of all human rights instruments, and encourages the exchange of information between the human rights treaty bodies and such organizations; 28. Recalls, with regard to the election of the members of the human rights treaty bodies, the importance of giving consideration to equitable geographical distribution of membership and to the representation of the principal legal systems and of bearing in mind that the members shall be elected and shall serve in their personal capacity and shall be of high moral character, acknowledged independence and /...