The Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank is to hold its annual meetings in June, with the first being convened in 2016 in Beijing, according to a Finance Ministry official.

The meeting will come just five months after the bank becomes formally operational this month, according to the official, who declined to be named.

The first meetings of the bank's board of governors and board of directors, due to be held from Jan 16 to 18, will elect the first president and 12 constituency directors. It will also draw up rules on operations, financing and human resources.

The AIIB's annual meetings will gather governors - usually represented by finance ministers of each founding member. The meetings could also be held in other cities, the official says.

When the $100 billion multilateral lender was formally launched on Dec 25, 17 prospective founding members, representing 50.1 percent of the subscribed capital, had seen their domestic legislatures ratify the bank's charter - a critical condition for the bank to be legally valid.

Since then, another two members, Russia and the Maldives, have approved the charter, with the 19 countries representing 57 percent of the subscribed capital.

The other 38 prospective founding members are expected to have the charter - formally known as the Articles of Agreement - approved domestically before the deadline at the end of 2016.

(China Daily European Weekly 01/08/2016 page14)