lving an expenditure of approximately four
hundred thousand dollars contributed by a Persian follower of the Faith,
whilst negotiations have been initiated for the acquisition of the site of
the Bab's incarceration in the mountains of A_dh_irbayjan. Full rights
have been accorded to Baha'i women residing in the cradle of the Faith, to
participate in the membership of both national and local Baha'i Spiritual
Assemblies, removing thereby the last remaining obstacle to the enjoyment
of complete equality of rights in the conduct of the administrative
affairs of the Persian Baha'i Community.

Eleven Temple Funds have been inaugurated, amounting to almost a quarter
of a million dollars, for the purchase of land for future Baha'i Temples
in the Western Hemisphere, in the European, the African, the Asiatic and
the Australian continents, followed by the purchase of a four-acre plot,
commanding an extensive view of the Pacific Ocean and the greater portion
of Greater Sydney area, and by the selection of appropriate sites outside
the Cities of Frankfurt and of Panama City.

The institutions of Baha'i National Haziratu'l-Quds in East and West,
already reaching an estimated value of over a million and a half dollars,
have been enhanced through the purchase and formal opening of the
Haziratu'l-Quds of the Baha'is of Paris, destined to evolve into the
national administrative headquarters of the French Baha'i Community, and
through the inauguration of National Haziratu'l-Quds Funds in Anchorage,
Alaska, as well as in the capital cities of Italy and of Switzerland.

The initial landscaping of the area surrounding the Mother Temple of the
West, involving an expenditure of over two hundred and fifty thousand
dollars, has been completed and been followed by an appropriation of two
hundred and twenty thousand dollars by the United States National
Spiritual Assembly for the completion of the entire project. The nature of
the first Dependency of the Ma_sh_riqu'l-A_dh_kar of Wilmette has been
finally decided upon by the members of that same Assembly, in anticipation
of its early establishment within the precincts of the Mother Temple of
the West. The Local Spiritual Assemblies of San Diego, Sacramento and
Fresno in California, of Tucson in Arizona, and of Oak Park in Illinois
have been legally incorporated, raising the number of national and local
Baha'i incorporated Assemblies in the United States of America and in the
entire Baha'i world to