The Curriculum of Imco

As if such creatures were cheaper by the dozen, the family of UN specialized agencies celebrated the nativity of its twelfth and most recent member on March 17, 1958, when the Convention of the Intergovernmental Maritime Consultative Organization (IMCO) entered into force after ten long years of anxious gestation. The organization has from the first been a child of suspicion, its fortunes subject to the various styles of amour propre indulged in by its parents. The government of Greece, for example, having disavowed paternity by withdrawing its original instrument of ratification when IMCO was yet unborn, underwent still another change of heart and reinstated its ratification in time to attend the baptismal ceremonies of the opening session at the organization's headquarters in London. To make public its doubts, however, that instrument bore an undisguised caveat that, in the event “the Organization extends its activities to matters of commercial and economic nature, the Greek Government may find itself bound to reconsider its acceptance†and have recourse to the withdrawal procedures in Article 59 of the Convention.