United Nations ? The U.N. Security Council unanimously adopted a resolution Friday expanding U.N. sanctions against al-Qaida and the Taliban to their affiliates and splinter groups and clamping down on terrorist financing.

Sanctions currently require all 191 U.N. member states to impose a travel ban and arms embargo against Afghanistan’s former Taliban leaders, Osama bin Laden and his al-Qaida terrorist network and those “associated with” them, and to freeze their financial assets.

The new resolution adopted by the council spells out for the first time who is included among al-Qaida and the Taliban’s associates.

Among other things, it states that people who finance or plan acts to support the outlawed groups and who recruit or provide weapons for bin Laden, al-Qaida, the Taliban “or any cell, affiliate, splinter group or derivative thereof” will face sanctions.

For the first time, the resolution also urges nations to enact recommendations set out by the Financial Action Task Force, a group of more than 50 nations seeking to tighten controls on underground money transfers used to bankroll the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on America and other terrorist activities.

“We have increased the pressure on Al-Qaida, the Taliban, and their associates,” acting U.S. ambassador Anne Patterson said in a statement.

Earlier this year, a U.N. team investigating compliance with the sanctions against al-Qaida and the Taliban found that bin Laden’s followers still have easy access to bombmaking materials and money.

It also noted that no member state reported a violation of the travel ban – but it was “difficult to believe” no al-Qaida or Taliban member had crossed a national border.

The Security Council imposed sanctions against the Taliban in November 1999 for refusing to send bin Laden to the United States or a third country for trial on terrorism charges in connection with the 1998 twin U.S. embassy bombings in Africa. The sanctions were later extended to al-Qaida.

Algeria’s U.N. Ambassador Abdallah Baali, whose country just suffered the killing of two diplomats in Iraq reportedly by al-Qaida, said the new resolution “comes at a very important moment when terrorism is showing, in fact, more strength and maybe has been more threatening.”