A/RES/53/207 Page 5 9. Requests the Secretary-General to ensure that the regional commissions provide technical assistance to Member States, including through their respective regional organizations; 10. Notes the efforts made to improve the quality of the programme performance report and to review performance within the context of the medium-term plan for the period 1992-1997, and stresses that in future reports more emphasis should be placed upon qualitative analysis to reflect achievements in implementing programme activities; 11. Reaffirms regulation 4.1 of the Financial Regulations and Rules of the United Nations, and reiterates that resources should be utilized strictly for the purposes approved by the General Assembly; 12. Notes with concern that some of the findings contained in the programme performance report for the biennium 1996–1997 are ambiguous and contradictory and that therefore some of the conclusions remain vague and general in nature; 13. Also notes with concern that the programme performance report for the biennium 1996–1997, in some instances, commented on actions which did not conform with the resolutions of the General Assembly; 14. Further notes with concern that some resources were redeployed to fund activities that had not been approved in the programme budget for the biennium 1996–1997, while a number of mandated programmes and activities, particularly in priority areas, were postponed, curtailed or cancelled; 15. Requests the Secretary-General, in the light of paragraph 57 of the programme performance report for the biennium 1996–1997,14 to report with clear evidence on the impact of the reform of the Organization and restructuring of the Secretariat on programme delivery during the biennium 1998–1999 in the context of the report on the programme performance of the United Nations for that biennium; 16. Notes the finding in the programme performance report for the biennium 1996–1997 that programme managers, in accordance with the decisions of the General Assembly and the relevant regulations and rules, have managed to minimize the adverse effect of financial constraints and achieved high rates of implementation in some areas; 17. Recognizes the need for effective systems at the intergovernmental and departmental levels to ensure that activities correspond to the mandates reflected in the medium-term plan and programme budgets, as well as the need to monitor and evaluate the quality of performance; 18. Requests the Secretary-General to submit proposals for consideration by the Committee for Programme and Coordination at its thirty-ninth session on ways in which the full implementation and the quality of mandated programmes and activities could be ensured and could be better assessed by and reported to Member States; 19. Also requests the Secretary-General to convey the reasons for the further postponement of the delivery of outputs to the biennium 1998–1999 and the opinion of relevant intergovernmental bodies on the proposal by the Secretary-General to delete fifty-seven outputs carried over from the biennium 1994–1995, for consideration at its current session; 14 A/53/122. /...