A/74/44 VII. Meetings of the Committee in 2019 68. Further to General Assembly resolution 68/268, the Committee is to hold two further regular sessions in 2019: the sixty-seventh session (22 July–9 August 2019) and the sixty-eighth session (11 November–6 December 2019). In a letter dated 30 April 2019, the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights informed all treaty bodies that due to the shortfall in funding, further exacerbated by a deepening cash-flow crisis for the United Nations and a 25-per-cent reduction in the resources budgeted for the travel of highlevel experts, it might not be possible to hold a number of sessions scheduled for later in 2019. The sessions affected would include the third sessions of those treaty bodies that would normally meet more than twice during the year, including the Committee’s session in November to December 2019. By midyear, the United Nations Secretariat should have a clearer understanding of the financial situation for the United Nations in general and for OHCHR, particularly the treaty bodies, for the remainder of the year. The Secretariat would confirm at that time whether it would be possible for the sessions to proceed. During the sixty-sixth session, the Committee alerted States parties and non-governmental organizations to the gravity of the situation, which could have serious consequences for the treaty body system. On 10 May 2019, the Chair of the Committee, jointly with the Chairs of the other treaty bodies, sent a letter to the Secretary-General and the High Commissioner. Without questioning the seriousness of the current financial situation, or the need to respond to the situation by taking practical measures, including through savings in expenditure, the Chairs of the treaty bodies highlighted that the treaty bodies, as an independent, legally based and expert-driven system focused on the oversight of fundamental human rights, was entitled to greater protection. They stressed that it was particularly unfortunate that such undermining was happening at the current time, since in 2020 the General Assembly would review the human rights treaty body system. The budget cuts and their consequences would set benchmarks in that review process and would thus prevent it from making a positive and constructive contribution to the future of human rights protection. The Chairs of the treaty bodies believed that responding to the crisis by cutting back on legally obligatory oversight of human rights commitments would set a poor example and merely encourage those States whose human rights records required critical scrutiny to continue to evade their responsibilities by cutting funding even further. A more effective – and robust – response would be to protect the integrity of the human rights treaty body system, thereby sending a clear message to States that the legal oversight of their human rights obligations would be not be resiled from. VIII. Adoption of the annual report of the Committee on its activities 69. In accordance with article 24 of the Convention, the Committee is required to submit an annual report on its activities to the States parties and to the General Assembly. Since the Committee holds its third regular session of each calendar year in November, which coincides with the regular sessions of the General Assembly, it adopts its annual report at the end of its spring session, for transmission to the General Assembly during the same calendar year. Accordingly, at its 1756th meeting, held on 17 May 2019 (see CAT/C/SR.1756), the Committee considered and adopted the report on its activities at the sixty-fourth, sixty-fifth and sixty-sixth sessions 15