Organisational matters CPT membership 86. On 31 December 2018, the CPT comprised 44 members. The seats in respect of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Greece and Iceland were vacant. Twenty-five of the CPT’s members were men and 19 were women. Consequently, applying the “less-than-40%” criterion used by the Parliamentary Assembly in Resolution 1540 (2007),19 neither sex is currently under-represented in the Committee. 87. In the course of 2018, the composition of the CPT underwent a few changes. It was with great sorrow that the CPT learned of the death of its member Vassilis Karydis (Greece) on 19 June 2018. The CPT saluted his memory with deep sadness and profound respect and extended its condolences to his family. Matthías Halldórsson (Iceland) resigned on 7 July 2018. The CPT wishes to thank him warmly for his contribution to the Committee’s work. Towards the end of the year, Juan Carlos da Silva Ochoa was elected in respect of Spain. A list of CPT members as at 31 December 2018 is set out in Appendix 4. 88. The next biennial renewal of the CPT’s membership is due to take place at the end of 2019, the terms of office of 22 members of the Committee expiring on 19 December of that year. In this respect, it should be noted that 12 of the 22 seats (i.e. more than 50%) are currently occupied by women, which means that the 2019 renewal of membership may pose a risk for the gender balance within the Committee. The CPT trusts that all the national delegations concerned in the Parliamentary Assembly will put forward lists of candidates in good time, so as to enable the Bureau of the Assembly to transmit them to the Committee of Ministers by the end of June 2019 at the latest. If the election procedure for all the seats can be completed before the end of 2019, this will greatly facilitate the planning of the CPT’s activities for the following year. 19. See Resolution 1540 (2007), sub-paragraph 7.2, of the Council of Europe’s Parliamentary Assembly on improving selection procedures for CPT members: “[…] lists of candidates shall include at least one man and one woman, except when all candidates on the list are of the sex under-represented on the CPT (less than 40%) […]”. ► Page 37