United Nations

United Nations الأمم المتحدة 联合国 Organisation des Nations unies Организация Объединённых Наций Organización de las Naciones Unidas
Map showing the Member states of the United Nations This map does not represent the view of its members or the UN concerning the legal status of any country, nor does it accurately reflect which areas' governments have UN representation.
Headquarters		International territory in New York City, New York USA
Official languages		Arabic Chinese English French Russian Spanish
Membership		193 member states
Leaders
-	Secretary-General	Ban Ki-moon
-	Deputy Secretary-General	Asha-Rose Migiro
-	General Assembly President	Nassir Abdulaziz Al-Nasser
-	Security Council President	Susan Rice
Establishment
-	United Nations Charter signed	26 June 1945 (1945-06-26)
-	Entry into force of Charter	24 October 1945 (1945-10-24)
Website UN.org

The United Nations (UN) (French: Organisation des Nations unies (ONU) is an international organization. It was started after World War II with the idea of making a stronger version of the League of Nations. (The League had been supposed to stop wars from happening, but it failed.) Most nations are members of the UN and send people to the headquarters to hold meetings and pass resolutions (make decisions) about global issues. There are 193 member countries of the United Nations which includes all the internationally recognized countries except for Vatican City and Palestine which are observer countries.

The United Nations headquarters building in New York

The goals of the United Nations are:

• to keep world peace
• to help countries get along
• to improve living conditions for people all over the world
• and to make the world a better place.

History

After World War I, the nations of the world formed the League of Nations. This organization was a place where nations could talk through their differences calmly. However, some countries like Germany, Italy and Japan ignored the League and tried to solve their problems through war. Because members of the League of Nations did not want to go to war to protect other members, the League failed and the Second World War began.

During World War II, the Allied Powers often called themselves "the United Nations" (united against the Axis Powers). After the War, the winners formed a new organization for world peace. On 25th April 1945 in San Francisco, they decided on the name 'United Nations'. The UN was created on 24th October 1945 and its first meeting was held in January 1946. Since 1947 the 24th of October has been called 'United Nations Day'.

Activity

The main building for the United Nations is in New York City in the United States of America, but the UN also has important offices in Geneva (Switzerland), Nairobi (Kenya) and Vienna (Austria). The UN tries to be peaceful, but sometimes when talks do not work the UN, unlike the League of Nations, will fight too. In the 1950s the UN helped South Korea in a war against North Korea, and in the 1990s the UN helped to force Iraqi soldiers out of Kuwait. At other times, the UN has formed 'peacekeeping' forces. UN peacekeepers travel to troubled places in the world and try - sometimes successfully, sometimes not - to keep the peace. Today there are UN peacekeepers working in Afghanistan, Cyprus, Haiti, Liberia and several other countries. Through a series of goals, resolutions and declarations adopted by member nations of the United Nations, the world has a set of commitments, actions and goals to stop and reverse the spread of HIV and scale up towards universal access to HIV prevention, treatment, care and support services.

Divisions

The United Nations has set up six "principal organs":

Principal organs of the United Nations

UN General Assembly - Deliberative assembly of all UN member states (each country has one vote) -		UN Secretariat - Administrative organ of the UN - its chairman is the UN Secretary General -		International Court of Justice - Universal court for international law (based in The Hague) -
may resolve non-compulsory recommendations to states, or suggestions to the UNSC (not a Parliament) decides on the admission of new members, on proposal of the UNSC adopts the budget elects the non-permanent members of the UNSC, all members of Economic and Social Council, on the proposal of the UNSC the UN Secretary General, and the 15 judges of the ICJ		supports the other UN bodies administratively, e.g. in the organization of conferences, writing reports and studies, and the preparation of the budget-plan its chairman - the UN Secretary General - is elected by the UN General Assembly for a five-year mandate and is the most important representative of the UN beside its headquarters in New York City it has three main offices in Geneva, Nairobi and Vienna		decides disputes between states that recognize its jurisdiction and creates legal opinions the 15 judges are elected by the UN General Assembly for nine years. It renders judgement with relative majority parties on the ICJ can only be countries, however no international organizations and other subjects of international law (not to be confused with the ICC)
UN Security Council - For international security issues -	UN Economic and Social Council - For global economical and social affairs -	UN Trusteeship Council - Was administering trust territories (currently not active) -
responsible for the maintenance of international peace and security the most powerful organ of the UN, as it may adopt compulsory resolutions its decisions include peacekeeping- and peace enforcement-missions, as well as non-military pressure mediums, such as trade embargos has 15 members: five permanent members with veto power (China, Russia, France, the United Kingdom and the United States), and ten elected members	responsible for cooperation between states on economic and social fields (raising the general standard of living, solve economic, social and health problems, promotion of human rights, culture and education, as well as humanitarian aid) therefore it has established numerous functional and regional commissions also coordinates the cooperation with the numerous specialized agencies of the United Nations has 54 members, who are elected by the UN General Assembly to serve staggered three-year mandates	was originally designed to manage colonial possessions that were earlier League of Nations mandates is inactive since 1994, with the last trust territory (Namibia) attaining independence in 1990

Additionally there are some so-called "special agencies of the United Nations" (this is only a selection):

• The United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF)
• The World Health Organization (WHO)
• The Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO)
• The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO)
• The International Labour Organization (ILO)
• The International Monetary Fund
• The United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP)
• The United Nations Development Programme (UNDP)

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Other pages

• Members of the United Nations
• UNESCO World Heritage Sites
• Globalism

Other websites

• UN website
• UN Foundation website