U.N. approves peace resolutions

UNITED NATIONS — The General Assembly and Security Council unanimously approved resolutions Tuesday establishing a new U.N. Peacebuilding Commission to help countries emerging from conflict manage the difficult transition to stability and development.

Secretary-General Kofi Annan said the resolutions go a long way to bridging a critical gap that too often has seen "a fragile peace ... crumble into renewed conflict."

At the U.N. summit in September, world leaders decided to create the commission, but the resolutions were needed to launch it and spell out its exact role, composition and operation — which were the subject of intense debate.

The adoption of the resolutions marked the first major outcome of the summit — the largest-ever gathering of world leaders in history that focused on U.N. reform. But the United States and the European Union consider it just a first step and are focusing their attention on contentious management reforms.

General Assembly President Jan Eliasson called the resolutions "truly historic" because they will, for the first time, create a U.N. body to try to ensure that countries emerging from war move toward peace.

"It will be our best chance to reverse the trend, which in recent years we have seen around the world where half the countries emerging from conflict are lapsing back into it again within five years," he said.

South Africa's U.N. Ambassador Dumisani Kumalo said the commission will be judged on whether it makes a difference for millions of people in Guinea-Bissau, Liberia, Burundi and other African countries recently emerging from conflicts.

The General Assembly approved the resolution by consensus after Venezuela's deputy U.N. ambassador Imeria Núñez de Odremán objected that the commission was a mechanism "for intervention by states through a perverted and bogus multilateralism, serving the will of the United States and its allies."

The Security Council approved a similar resolution by an unanimous 15-0 vote.

The Security Council then approved a separate resolution that would give the five permanent council members — the United States, Britain, France, Russia and China — membership on the permanent Organizational Committee that will oversee the commission's operations.