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By Michelle Nichols

UNITED NATIONS, March 28 (Reuters) - The U.N. Security Council said on Wednesday it supported the appointment of rebel leader Guillaume Soro as Ivory Coast's prime minister under a plan to reunite the country.

Ivory Coast President Laurent Gbagbo said a new government could be in place in the world's top cocoa grower within days.

Gbagbo and Soro, leader of the New Forces rebels who hold the north of Ivory Coast, signed a peace deal three weeks ago to reunite the West African country, divided since a brief 2002-2003 civil war.

"The Security Council expresses its readiness to take further steps, in the light of the progress achieved, in order to help the parties in implementing their commitments and to support the peace process," the panel said in a statement read by South African Foreign Minister Dalamini Zuma, whose country is council president for March.

Ivory Coast, a former French colony, has been split between a rebel-held north and government-run south since the war. A string of foreign-brokered peace deals has failed to reunite the country, previously a haven of stability in West Africa.

The latest peace agreement has already led to the creation of a joint army command center to focus on demobilizing militia fighters from both sides, raising hopes for reunification.

Analysts and some diplomats say it could meet with more success than previous accords because it is the first to be "home grown" -- agreed on by Gbagbo and Soro directly and brokered by a neighbor, Burkina Faso, trusted by both sides.

France said last week it would send home about 500 of its 3,500 peacekeepers in Ivory Coast, who are supporting more than 7,000 U.N. troops policing a buffer zone between the rebel and government halves of the country.

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