Land for no less than eight of eleven Temple sites to be acquired
according to the provisions of the Ten-Year Plan, and involving an
expenditure of eighty thousand dollars has been purchased in the following
places: in the holy city of Ba_gh_dad, on the banks of the Tigris, blessed
by the footsteps of Baha'u'llah, of an area of thirty thousand square
meters; on the banks of the Nile in Cairo, the center of both the Arab and
Islamic worlds, of an area of seventeen thousand square meters; in
Frankfurt, the heart of the European continent, of an area of seventeen
thousand square meters; in New Delhi, the capital of India, of an area of
sixty-six thousand square meters; in Sydney, the oldest Baha'i center in
the Australian continent, of an area of eleven thousand square meters; in
Kampala, in the heart of the African continent, of an area of twenty-four
thousand square meters; in Johannesburg, the second largest city in the
African continent, of an area of six thousand square meters; and in Panama
City, the importance of which has been underlined by 'Abdu'l-Baha in the
Tablets of the Divine Plan, of an area of twenty thousand square meters.
No less than fourteen national Haziratu'l-Quds, out of the forty-nine
listed in the provisions of the Ten-Year Plan and which are to serve as
seats of future Baha'i National Spiritual Assemblies, have already been
purchased, largely through the liberal contributions of the Hand of the
Cause, Amelia Collins. These buildings, involving the expenditure of over
two hundred thousand dollars, are situated in five continents of the
globe; in London, Bern and Vienna in the European continent; in Anchorage,
Lima and Panama City in the American continent; in Tokyo, Istanbul, Kabul,
Bahrayn and Suva in the Asiatic continent; in Johannesburg and Tunis in
the African continent; and in Auckland in the Antipodes. Negotiations for
the purchase of three additional Haziratu'l-Quds, in the cities of Rome,
Jakarta and Colombo are moreover under way, while funds, totalling one
hundred and thirty thousand dollars have been pledged for the purchase, in
the immediate future, of twenty-seven other Haziratu'l-Quds in Latin
America and the European continent.
Furthermore, the sum of fifty thousand dollars has been contributed by the
Hand of the Cause, Amelia Collins, as yet another evidence of her
munificence, for the purpose of establishing Baha'i national endowments in
no less than fifty countries, situated in all five continents of the
globe. A plot has, moreover, been purchased in South Africa, a property
offered in the Aleutian Islands and a fund initiated for the same purpose
in Alaska and Finland.