UNITED NATIONS - After months of negotiations among key states on demands for an increase in troop costs, the General Assembly approved a supplemental payment of over 80 million dollars to Pakistan and other countries contributing personnel to UN peacekeeping missions around the world. Over the weekend, the 192-member Assembly acted by consensus to authorise the extra funding. The supplemental payment of $85 million to peacekeepers represents a seven per cent increase in the troop costs, a measure which was earlier strongly opposed by major financial contributors including the US and the EU. During the session, the Assembly, acting on the recommendations of its fifth committee also adopted a peacekeeping budget of more than $7 billion for 13 peacekeeping missions covering the period from July 1, 2011 to June 30, 2012. In adopting the text on the supplemental payments, the Assembly took note of the fact that the last review of troop costs took place 20 years ago, with a subsequent ad hoc increase in 2002. As that was the case, troop-contributing countries, according to the text, had long expressed concern that increasing costs placed a difficult financial burden on them, which, they asserted, could jeopardise their continued participation in peacekeeping operations.