According to World Bank statistics, 50% of countries emerging from conflict situations experience a new break-out of the conflict within five years of signing a peace agreement. This figure dramatizes the need for stronger targeted support to guarantee a successful transition from conflict to full-fledged stability. To meet this need, the Heads of State and Government of the UN Member States established the Peacebuilding Commission at the World Summit in New York in September 2005. The idea was to create an innovative body that, by involving all the interested parties, would coordinate peace-building activities and integrate them into a single strategic framework that reflected the interdependence, in fostering stability, of political, military, and economic factors. Its focus was to provide support to post-conflict countries and thus create the pre-conditions for effective post-conflict reconstruction: police, rule of law, security sector reform, national reconciliation, disarmament, demobilization and reintegration of ex-combatants, and economic reconstruction. The PBC was established as an advisory body to both the General Assembly and the Security Council to enhance the international community’s attention to the needs of the Countries on the agenda and to marshal additional resources for them. Its 31 members are selected for two-year terms from the three main organs (the General Assembly, the Security Council, and ECOSOC), or on the basis of their overall financial contribution to the UN or UN peace-keeping. Italy was granted the status of PBC member for the 2006-2008 biennium for the first reason. Our country has been a strong supporter of the PBC since the proposal was first circulated. It is now one of the major stakeholders and promoters. Italy’s action within the Commission is inspired by the goal of promoting integrated peace-building strategies that coordinate the efforts of the Governments, donors, UN agencies, NGOs, and civil society, preventing gaps and overlaps, and fostering the PBC’s added value. At the request of the interested States, the Commission’s agenda currently includes Burundi, Sierra Leone, Guinea Bissau and the Central African Republic. To facilitate the formulation of integrated and widely-shared peace-building strategies, the PBC convenes in special meetings dedicated to country situations. Not only governments take part, with a central role, but also representatives of local civil society, NGOs, donors and relevant stakeholders, the international financial institutions (in particular the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank), the European Commission, the Presidents-in-office of the European Union and of the relevant regional and sub-regional organizations. Since June 2006 the Peacebuilding Commission has approved three Integrated Peacebuilding Strategies for Burundi, Sierra Leone, and Guinea Bissau, and is currently drafting one for the Central African Republic. For more information about the PBC, please consult the Commission’s webpage: www.un.org/peace/peacebuilding