The United Nations Security Council endorsed a report by the Secretary-General stating that while UNOCI had created increased stability in Côte d'Ivoire, the fragile and delicate electoral process required the UN force to remain in the country as well as to complete implementation of goals set forth by the March 2007 Ouagadougou Agreement,[2] involving disarmament and identification of the population,[3] in order to allow free elections. Thus the resolution extended UNCOI mandate by six months to 31 July 2009. The force was reduced by a battalion, decreasing the number of UN peacekeepers from 8,115 to 7,450, as well as placing peacekeepers in fewer, but more concentrated, positions, from which sufficient troop numbers could be rapidly deployed as airborne quick-reaction detachments.