A/RES/57/251. Resolution of the United Nations General Assembly, 2002

• Resolution Number: A/RES/57/251
• Year: 2002
• Session: 57th
• Issuer: General Assembly of the United Nation

United Nations A/RES/57/251

General Assembly Distr.: General

21 February 2003

Fifty-seventh session

Agenda item 87

_______________

Resolution adopted by the General Assembly

[on the report of the Second Committee (A/57/532/Add.7)]

57/251. Report of the Governing Council of the United Nations

Environment Programme on its seventh special session

The General Assembly,

Recalling its resolution 2997 (XXVII) of 15 December 1972, by which it

established the Governing Council of the United Nations Environment Programme,

Recalling also its resolutions 53/242 of 28 July 1999 and 56/193 of

21 December 2001 on the report of the Governing Council of the United Nations

Environment Programme on its twenty-first session,

Having considered the report of the Governing Council of the United Nations

Environment Programme on its seventh special session,

1

Taking into account the Plan of Implementation of the World Summit on

Sustainable Development (“Johannesburg Plan of Implementation”),

2

Recalling that in the Johannesburg Plan of Implementation the General

Assembly was invited to consider, at its fifty-seventh session, the important but

complex issue of establishing universal membership for the Governing

Council/Global Ministerial Environment Forum of the United Nations Environment

Programme,

Underlining the unique role of the General Assembly, as the highest

intergovernmental decision-making body of the United Nations, in giving

consideration to the issue of establishing universal membership for the Governing

Council/Global Ministerial Environment Forum of the United Nations Environment

Programme and, therefore, the need for a thorough analysis by Member States and

the relevant bodies of the United Nations system to enable the General Assembly to

fully consider all its implications, including legal, political, institutional, financial

and system-wide implications, before making a decision,

Reaffirming the role of the United Nations Environment Programme as the

principal body within the United Nations system in the field of environment, which

1 Official Records of the General Assembly, Fifty-seventh Session, Supplement No. 25 (A/57/25).

2 Report of the World Summit on Sustainable Development, Johannesburg, South Africa, 26 August–

4 September 2002 (United Nations publication, Sales No. E.03.II.A.1 and corrigendum), chap. I, resolution

2, annex.

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