23 Facts About UN

The UN is headquartered on international territory in New York City, and has other main offices in Geneva, Nairobi, Vienna, and The Hague .

UN was established after World War II with the aim of preventing future wars, succeeding the League of Nations, which was characterized as ineffective.

UN membership grew significantly following widespread decolonization beginning in the 1960s.

General Assembly selected New York City as the site for the headquarters of the UN, construction began on 14 September 1948 and the facility was completed on 9 October 1952.

In 1991, the UN authorized a US-led coalition that repulsed the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait.

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The 2005 World Summit reaffirmed the UN's focus on promoting development, peacekeeping, human rights, and global security.

The six official languages of the UN, used in intergovernmental meetings and documents, are Arabic, Chinese, English, French, Russian, and Spanish.

In practice, the International Civil Service Commission, which governs the conditions of UN personnel, takes reference to the highest-paying national civil service.

The five permanent members hold veto power over UN resolutions, allowing a permanent member to block adoption of a resolution, though not debate.

UN Secretariat carries out the day-to-day duties required to operate and maintain the UN system.

The Cook Islands and Niue, both states in free association with New Zealand, are full members of several UN specialized agencies and have had their "full treaty-making capacity" recognized by the Secretariat.

Group of 77 at the UN is a loose coalition of developing nations, designed to promote its members' collective economic interests and create an enhanced joint negotiating capacity in the UN.

Situations in which the UN has not only acted to keep the peace but intervened include the Korean War and the authorization of intervention in Iraq after the Gulf War .

The UN has been involved with arms-limitation treaties, such as the Outer Space Treaty, the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, the Seabed Arms Control Treaty, the Biological Weapons Convention, the Chemical Weapons Convention, and the Ottawa Treaty, which prohibits landmines.

Three UN bodies oversee arms proliferation issues: the International Atomic Energy Agency, the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, and the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organization Preparatory Commission.

Jacques Fomerand, a scholar of the UN, describes this organization's mandate as "broad and vague", with only "meagre" resources to carry it out.

The UN-sponsored Kyoto Protocol, signed in 1997, set legally binding emissions reduction targets for ratifying states.

UN declares and co-ordinates international observances that bring awareness to issues of international interest or concern; examples include World Tuberculosis Day, Earth Day, and the International Year of Deserts and Desertification.

UN's knows that no state, no matter how powerful, can solve urgent problems, fight for development and bring an end to all crises.

Jacques Fomerand states the most enduring divide in views of the UN is "the North–South split" between richer Northern nations and developing Southern nations.

Adherents to the realist school of thought take a pessimistic position, arguing that the UN is not an effective organization because it is dominated and constrained by great powers.

In 2004, the UN faced accusations that its recently ended Oil-for-Food Programme — in which Iraq had been allowed to trade oil for basic needs to relieve the pressure of sanctions — had suffered from widespread corruption, including billions of dollars of kickbacks.

MUN has many famous and notable alumni, such as former UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon.