United Nations General Assembly A/RES/57/251 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). 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. 2 02 55594