On 25 April 1945, 50 governments met in San Francisco<\/a> for a conference and started drafting the UN Charter<\/a>, which was adopted on 25 June 1945 in the San Francisco Opera House<\/a>, and signed on 26 June 1945 in the Herbst Theatre<\/a> auditorium in the Veterans War Memorial Building<\/a>. This charter took effect on 24 October 1945, when the UN began operation.<\/p>\n The UN’s mission to preserve world peace was complicated in its early decades during the Cold War<\/a> between the United States and Soviet Union<\/a> and their respective allies. Its missions have consisted primarily of unarmed military observers and lightly armed troops with primarily monitoring, reporting and confidence-building roles. The organization’s membership grew significantly following widespread decolonization which started in the 1960s. Since then, 80 former colonies had gained independence, including 11 trust territories, which were monitored by the Trusteeship Council<\/a>. By the 1970s its budget for economic and social development programs far outstripped its spending on peacekeeping. After the end of the Cold War, the UN shifted and expanded its field operations, undertaking a wide variety of complex tasks.<\/p>\n The UN has six principal organs: the General Assembly<\/a>; the Security Council<\/a>; the Economic and Social Council<\/a>; the Trusteeship Council; the International Court of Justice<\/a>; and the UN Secretariat<\/a>. The UN System agencies include the World Bank Group<\/a>, the World Health Organization<\/a>, the World Food Programme<\/a>, UNESCO<\/a>, and UNICEF<\/a>. The UN’s most prominent officer is the Secretary-General<\/a>, an office held by Portuguese politician and diplomat Ant\u00f3nio Guterres<\/a> since 1 January 2017. Non-governmental organizations may be granted consultative status with ECOSOC and other agencies to participate in the UN’s work.<\/p>\n The organization, its officers and its agencies have won many Nobel Peace Prizes<\/a>.<\/p>\n Other evaluations of the UN’s effectiveness have been mixed. Some commentators believe the organization to be an important force for peace and human development, while others have called the organization ineffective, corrupt, or biased.<\/p>\n In the century prior to the UN’s creation, several international treaty organizations such as the International Committee of the Red Cross<\/a> was formed to ensure protection and assistance for victims of armed conflict and strife. In 1914, a political assassination in Sarajevo<\/a> set off a chain of events that led to the outbreak of World War I<\/a> As more and more young men were sent down into the trenches, influential voices in the United States<\/a> and Britain<\/a> began calling for the establishment of a permanent international body to maintain peace in the postwar world. President Woodrow Wilson<\/a> became a vocal advocate of this concept, and in 1918 he included a sketch of the international body in his 14-point proposal to end the war. In November 1918, the Central Powers<\/a> agreed to an armistice to halt the killing in World War I. Two months later, the Allies met with Germany<\/a> and Austria-Hungary<\/a> at Versailles<\/a> to hammer out formal peace terms. President Wilson wanted peace, but England<\/a> and France<\/a> disagreed, forcing harsh war reparations on their former enemies. The League of Nations was approved, and in the summer of 1919 Wilson presented the Treaty of Versailles<\/a> and the Covenant of the League of Nations<\/a> to the US Senate for ratification.<\/p>\n On January 10, 1920, the League of Nations formally comes into being when the Covenant of the League of Nations, ratified by 42 nations in 1919, takes effect. However, at some point the League became ineffective when it failed to act against the Japanese invasion of Manchuria<\/a> as in February 1933, 40 nations voted for Japan<\/a> to withdraw from Manchuria<\/a> but Japan voted against it and walked out of the League instead of withdrawing from Manchuria. It also failed against the Second Italo-Ethiopian War<\/a> despite trying to talk to Benito Mussolini<\/a> as he used the time to send an army to Africa<\/a>, so the League had a plan for Mussolini to just take a part of Ethiopia<\/a>, but he ignored the League and invaded Ethiopia, the League tried putting sanctions on Italy<\/a>, but Italy had already conquered Ethiopia and the League had failed. After Italy conquered Ethiopia, Italy and other nations left the league. But all of them realized that it had failed and they began to re-arm as fast as possible. During 1938, Britain and France tried negotiating directly with Hitler<\/a> but this failed in 1939 when Hitler invaded Czechoslovakia<\/a>. When war broke out in 1939, the League closed down and its headquarters in Geneva remained empty throughout the war.<\/p>\n The earliest concrete plan for a new world organization began under the aegis of the U.S. State Department<\/a> in 1939. The text of the “Declaration by United Nations” was drafted at the White House<\/a> on December 29, 1941, by President Franklin D. Roosevelt<\/a>, Prime Minister Winston Churchill<\/a>, and Roosevelt aide Harry Hopkins<\/a>.<\/p>\n It incorporated Soviet suggestions, but left no role for France. “Four Policemen” was coined to refer to four major Allied countries, United States, United Kingdom, Soviet Union, and Republic of China<\/a>, which emerged in the Declaration by United Nations. Roosevelt first coined the term United Nations to describe the Allied countries. “On New Year’s Day 1942, President Roosevelt, Prime Minister Churchill, Maxim Litvinov<\/a>, of the USSR, and T. V. Soong<\/a>, of China, signed a short document which later came to be known as the United Nations Declaration and the next day the representatives of twenty-two other nations added their signatures.” The term United Nations was first officially used when 26 governments signed this Declaration. One major change from the Atlantic Charter<\/a> was the addition of a provision for religious freedom, which Stalin<\/a> approved after Roosevelt insisted. By 1 March 1945, 21 additional states had signed.<\/p>\n A JOINT DECLARATION BY THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, THE UNITED KINGDOM OF GREAT BRITAIN AND NORTHERN IRELAND, THE UNION OF SOVIET SOCIALIST REPUBLICS, CHINA, AUSTRALIA<\/a>, BELGIUM<\/a>, CANADA<\/a>, COSTA RICA<\/a>, CUBA<\/a>, CZECHOSLOVAKIA, DOMINICAN REPUBLIC<\/a>, EL SALVADOR<\/a>, GREECE<\/a>, GUATEMALA<\/a>, HAITI<\/a>, HONDURAS<\/a>, INDIA<\/a>, LUXEMBOURG<\/a>, NETHERLANDS<\/a>, NEW ZEALAND<\/a>, NICARAGUA<\/a>, NORWAY<\/a>, PANAMA<\/a>, POLAND<\/a>, SOUTH AFRICA<\/a>, YUGOSLAVIA<\/a><\/p>\n The Governments signatory hereto,<\/p>\n Having subscribed to a common program of purposes and principles embodied in the Joint Declaration of the President of the United States of America and the Prime Minister of Great Britain dated August 14, 1941, known as the Atlantic Charter,<\/p>\n Being convinced that complete victory over their enemies is essential to defend life, liberty, independence and religious freedom, and to preserve human rights and justice in their own lands as well as in other lands, and that they are now engaged in a common struggle against savage and brutal forces seeking to subjugate the world,<\/p>\n DECLARE:<\/p>\n Each Government pledges itself to employ its full resources, military or economic, against those members of the Tripartite Pact<\/a> and its adherents with which such government is at war.<\/p>\n Each Government pledges itself to cooperate with the Governments signatory hereto and not to make a separate armistice or peace with the enemies.<\/p>\n The foregoing declaration may be adhered to by other nations which are, or which may be, rendering material assistance and contributions in the struggle for victory over Hitlerism.<\/p>\n \u2014\u2009The Washington Conference 1941\u20131942<\/a><\/p>\n During the war, “the United Nations” became the official term for the Allies. To join, countries had to sign the Declaration and declare war on the Axis<\/a>.<\/p>\n The UN was formulated and negotiated among the delegations from the Allied Big Four (the United States, the United Kingdom, the Soviet Union and China) at the Dumbarton Oaks Conference<\/a> from 21 September 1944 to October 7, 1944 and they agreed on the aims, structure and functioning of the UN. After months of planning, the UN Conference on International Organization<\/a> opened in San Francisco, 25 April 1945, attended by 50 governments and a number of non-governmental organizations involved in drafting the UN Charter. “The heads of the delegations of the sponsoring countries took turns as chairman of the plenary meetings: Anthony Eden, of Britain<\/a>, Edward Stettinius, of the United States<\/a>, T. V. Soong, of China, and Vyacheslav Molotov<\/a>, of the Soviet Union. At the later meetings, Lord Halifax<\/a> deputized for Mister Eden, Wellington Koo<\/a> for T. V. Soong, and Mister Gromyko<\/a> for Mister Molotov.” The UN officially came into existence 24 October 1945, upon ratification of the Charter by the five permanent members of the Security Council\u2014France, the Republic of China, the Soviet Union, the UK and the US\u2014and by a majority of the other 46 signatories.<\/p>\n The first meetings of the General Assembly, with 51 nations represented, and the Security Council took place in Methodist Central Hall<\/a>, Westminster<\/a>, London<\/a> beginning on 10 January 1946. The 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. Its site\u2014like UN headquarters buildings in Geneva, Vienna, and Nairobi\u2014is designated as international territory. The Norwegian Foreign Minister, Trygve Lie<\/a>, was elected as the first UN Secretary-General.<\/p>\n Though the UN’s primary mandate was peacekeeping, the division between the US and USSR often paralyzed the organization, generally allowing it to intervene only in conflicts distant from the Cold War. Two notable exceptions were a Security Council resolution on 7 July 1950 authorizing a US-led coalition to repel the North Korean invasion of South Korea<\/a>, passed in the absence of the USSR, and the signing of the Korean Armistice Agreement in 27 July 1953.<\/a><\/p>\n On 29 November 1947, the General Assembly approved a resolution to partition Palestine<\/a>, approving the creation of the state of Israel<\/a>. Two years later, Ralph Bunche<\/a>, a UN official, negotiated an armistice to the resulting conflict. On November 7, 1956, the first UN peacekeeping force was established to end the Suez Crisis<\/a>; however, the UN was unable to intervene against the USSR’s simultaneous invasion of Hungary<\/a> following that country’s revolution.<\/p>\n On 14 July 1960, the UN established United Nations Operation in the Congo (UNOC)<\/a>, the largest military force of its early decades, to bring order to the breakaway State of Katanga<\/a>, restoring it to the control of the Democratic Republic of the Congo<\/a> by 11 May 1964. While travelling to meet rebel leader Moise Tshombe<\/a> during the conflict, Dag Hammarskj\u00f6ld<\/a>, often named as one of the UN’s most effective Secretaries-General, died in a plane crash; months later he was posthumously awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. In 1964, Hammarskj\u00f6ld’s successor, U Thant<\/a>, deployed the UN Peacekeeping Force in Cyprus<\/a>, which would become one of the UN’s longest-running peacekeeping missions.<\/p>\n With the spread of decolonization in the 1960s, the organization’s membership saw an influx of newly independent nations. In 1960 alone, 17 new states joined the UN, 16 of them from Africa. On 25 October 1971, with opposition from the United States, but with the support of many Third World nations, the mainland, communist People’s Republic of China<\/a> was given the Chinese seat on the Security Council in place of the Republic of China<\/a> that occupied Taiwan<\/a>; the vote was widely seen as a sign of waning US influence in the organization. Third World<\/a> nations organized into the Group of 77 coalition<\/a> under the leadership of Algeria<\/a>, which briefly became a dominant power at the UN. On 10 November 1975, a bloc comprising the USSR and Third World nations passed a resolution, over strenuous US and Israeli opposition, declaring Zionism<\/a> to be racism; the resolution was repealed on 16 December 1991, shortly after the end of the Cold War.<\/p>\n With an increasing Third World presence and the failure of UN mediation in conflicts in the Middle East<\/a>, Vietnam<\/a>, and Kashmir<\/a>, the UN increasingly shifted its attention to its ostensibly secondary goals of economic development and cultural exchange. By the 1970s, the UN budget for social and economic development was far greater than its peacekeeping budget.<\/p>\n After the Cold War, the UN saw a radical expansion in its peacekeeping duties, taking on more missions in ten years than it had in the previous four decades. Between 1988 and 2000, the number of adopted Security Council resolutions more than doubled, and the peacekeeping budget increased more than tenfold. The UN negotiated an end to the Salvadoran Civil War<\/a>, launched a successful peacekeeping mission in Namibia<\/a>, and oversaw democratic elections in post-apartheid South Africa and post-Khmer Rouge<\/a> Cambodia<\/a>. In 1991, the UN authorized a US-led coalition that repulsed the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait<\/a>. Brian Urquhart, Under-Secretary-General<\/a> from 1971 to 1985, later described the hopes raised by these successes as a “false renaissance” for the organization, given the more troubled missions that followed.<\/p>\n Though the UN Charter had been written primarily to prevent aggression by one nation against another, in the early 1990s the UN faced a number of simultaneous, serious crises within nations such as Somalia<\/a>, Haiti, Mozambique<\/a>, and the former Yugoslavia. The UN mission in Somalia<\/a> was widely viewed as a failure after the US withdrawal following casualties in the Battle of Mogadishu,<\/a> and the UN mission to Bosnia<\/a> faced “worldwide ridicule” for its indecisive and confused mission in the face of ethnic cleansing. In 1994, the UN Assistance Mission for Rwanda<\/a> failed to intervene in the Rwandan genocide<\/a> amid indecision in the Security Council.<\/p>\n Beginning in the last decades of the Cold War, American and European critics of the UN condemned the organization for perceived mismanagement and corruption. In 1984, the US President, Ronald Reagan<\/a>, withdrew his nation’s funding from UNESCO (the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, founded 1946) over allegations of mismanagement, followed by Britain and Singapore<\/a>. Boutros Boutros-Ghali<\/a>, Secretary-General from 1992 to 1996, initiated a reform of the Secretariat, reducing the size of the organization somewhat. His successor, Kofi Annan<\/a> (1997\u20132006), initiated further management reforms in the face of threats from the United States to withhold its UN dues.<\/p>\n In the late 1990s and 2000s, international interventions authorized by the UN took a wider variety of forms. The UN mission in the Sierra Leone Civil War of 1991\u20132002<\/a> was supplemented by British Royal Marines<\/a>, and the invasion of Afghanistan<\/a> in 2001 was overseen by NATO<\/a>. In 2003, the United States invaded Iraq<\/a> despite failing to pass a UN Security Council resolution for authorization, prompting a new round of questioning of the organization’s effectiveness. Under the eighth Secretary-General, Ban Ki-moon<\/a>, the UN has intervened with peacekeepers in crises including the War in Darfur<\/a> in Sudan<\/a> and the Kivu conflict<\/a> in the Democratic Republic of Congo and sent observers and chemical weapons inspectors to the Syrian Civil War<\/a>. In 2013, an internal review of UN actions in the final battles of the Sri Lankan Civil War<\/a> in 2009 concluded that the organization had suffered “systemic failure”. One hundred and one UN personnel died in the 2010 Haiti earthquake<\/a>, the worst loss of life in the organization’s history.<\/p>\n The Millennium Summit<\/a> was held in 2000 to discuss the UN’s role in the 21st century. The three day meeting was the largest gathering of world leaders in history, and culminated in the adoption by all member states of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs)<\/a>, a commitment to achieve international development in areas such as poverty reduction, gender equality, and public health. Progress towards these goals, which were to be met by 2015, was ultimately uneven. The 2005 World Summit<\/a> reaffirmed the UN’s focus on promoting development, peacekeeping, human rights, and global security. The Sustainable Development Goals<\/a> were launched in 2015 to succeed the Millennium Development Goals.<\/p>\n In addition to addressing global challenges, the UN has sought to improve its accountability and democratic legitimacy by engaging more with civil society and fostering a global constituency. In an effort to enhance transparency, in 2016 the organization held its first public debate between candidates for Secretary-General. On 1 January 2017, Portuguese diplomat Ant\u00f3nio Guterres, who previously served as UN High Commissioner for Refugees, became the ninth Secretary-General. Guterres has highlighted several key goals for his administration, including an emphasis on diplomacy for preventing conflicts, more effective peacekeeping efforts, and streamlining the organization to be more responsive and versatile to global needs.<\/p>\n The UN system is based on five principal organs: the General Assembly, the Security Council, the Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC), the International Court of Justice and the UN Secretariat. A sixth principal organ, the Trusteeship Council, suspended operations on 1 November 1994, upon the independence of Palau<\/a>, the last remaining UN trustee territory.<\/p>\n Four of the five principal organs are located at the main UN Headquarters in New York City. The International Court of Justice is located in The Hague<\/a>, while other major agencies are based in the UN offices at Geneva, Vienna, and Nairobi. Other UN institutions are located throughout the world. The six official languages of the UN, used in intergovernmental meetings and documents, are Arabic, Chinese, English, French, Russian, and Spanish. On the basis of the Convention on the Privileges and Immunities of the United Nations<\/a>, the UN and its agencies are immune from the laws of the countries where they operate, safeguarding the UN’s impartiality with regard to the host and member countries.<\/p>\n Below the six organs sit, in the words of the author Linda Fasulo, “an amazing collection of entities and organizations, some of which are actually older than the UN itself and operate with almost complete independence from it”. These include specialized agencies, research and training institutions, programs and funds, and other UN entities.<\/p>\n The UN obeys the Noblemaire principle<\/a>, which is binding on any organization that belongs to the UN system. This principle calls for salaries that will draw and keep citizens of countries where salaries are highest, and also calls for equal pay for work of equal value independent of the employee’s nationality. In practice, the ICSC takes reference to the highest-paying national civil service. Staff salaries are subject to an internal tax that is administered by the UN organizations.<\/p>\n The General Assembly is the main deliberative assembly of the UN. Composed of all UN member states, the assembly meets in regular yearly sessions, but emergency sessions can also be called. The assembly is led by a president, elected from among the member states on a rotating regional basis, and 21 vice-presidents. The first session convened 10 January 1946 in the Methodist Central Hall in London and included representatives of 51 nations.<\/p>\n When the General Assembly decides on important questions such as those on peace and security, admission of new members and budgetary matters, a two-thirds majority of those present and voting is required. All other questions are decided by a majority vote. Each member country has one vote. Apart from approval of budgetary matters, resolutions are not binding on the members. The Assembly may make recommendations on any matters within the scope of the UN, except matters of peace and security that are under consideration by the Security Council.<\/p>\n The Security Council is charged with maintaining peace and security among countries. While other organs of the UN can only make “recommendations” to member states, the Security Council has the power to make binding decisions that member states have agreed to carry out, under the terms of Charter Article 25<\/a>. The decisions of the Council are known as United Nations Security Council resolutions.<\/p>\n The Security Council is made up of fifteen member states, consisting of five permanent members\u2014China, France, Russia<\/a>, the United Kingdom, and the United States\u2014and ten non-permanent members elected for two-year terms by the General Assembly. The five permanent members hold veto power over UN resolutions, allowing a permanent member to block adoption of a resolution, though not debate. The ten temporary seats are held for two-year terms, with five member states per year voted in by the General Assembly on a regional basis. The presidency of the Security Council rotates alphabetically each month.<\/p>\n The UN Secretariat is headed by the Secretary-General, assisted by the Deputy Secretary-General and a staff of international civil servants worldwide. It provides studies, information, and facilities needed by UN bodies for their meetings. It also carries out tasks as directed by the Security Council, the General Assembly, the Economic and Social Council, and other UN bodies.<\/p>\n The Secretary-General acts as the de facto spokesperson and leader of the UN. The position is defined in the UN Charter as the organization’s “chief administrative officer”. Article 99<\/a> of the charter states that the Secretary-General can bring to the Security Council’s attention “any matter which in his opinion may threaten the maintenance of international peace and security”, a phrase that Secretaries-General since Trygve Lie have interpreted as giving the position broad scope for action on the world stage. The office has evolved into a dual role of an administrator of the UN organization and a diplomat and mediator addressing disputes between member states and finding consensus to global issues.<\/p>\n The Secretary-General is appointed by the General Assembly, after being recommended by the Security Council, where the permanent members have veto power. There are no specific criteria for the post, but over the years it has become accepted that the post shall be held for one or two terms of five years. The current Secretary-General is Ant\u00f3nio Guterres, who replaced Ban Ki-moon in 2017.<\/p>\n The International Court of Justice (ICJ), located in The Hague, in the Netherlands, is the primary judicial organ of the UN. Established in 1945 by the UN Charter, the Court began work in 1946 as the successor to the Permanent Court of International Justice<\/a>. The ICJ is composed of 15 judges who serve 9-year terms and are appointed by the General Assembly; every sitting judge must be from a different nation.<\/p>\n It is based in the Peace Palace in The Hague<\/a>, sharing the building with the Hague Academy of International Law<\/a>, a private center for the study of international law. The ICJ’s primary purpose is to adjudicate disputes among states. The court has heard cases related to war crimes<\/a>, illegal state interference, ethnic cleansing<\/a>, and other issues. The ICJ can also be called upon by other UN organs to provide advisory opinions. It is the only organ that is not located in New York.<\/p>\n The Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) assists the General Assembly in promoting international economic and social co-operation and development. ECOSOC has 54 members, which are elected by the General Assembly for a three-year term. The president is elected for a one-year term and chosen among the small or middle powers represented on ECOSOC. The council has one annual meeting in July, held in either New York or Geneva. Viewed as separate from the specialized bodies it co-ordinates, ECOSOC’s functions include information gathering, advising member nations, and making recommendations. Owing to its broad mandate of co-ordinating many agencies, ECOSOC has at times been criticized as unfocused or irrelevant.<\/p>\n The UN Charter stipulates that each primary organ of the United Nations can establish various specialized agencies to fulfil its duties. These agencies are:<\/p>\n A full list of the member state of the United Nations is available elsewhere.<\/a><\/p>\n The main objectives of the United Nations are to provide for and protect the following:<\/p>\n Top 25 contributors to the United Nations budget for the period 2019 – 2021<\/p>\n The UN is financed from assessed and voluntary contributions from member states. The General Assembly approves the regular budget and determines the assessment for each member. This is broadly based on the relative capacity of each country to pay, as measured by its gross national income (GNI), with adjustments for external debt and low per capita income. The two-year budget for 2012\u201313 was $5.512 billion in total.<\/p>\n The Assembly has established the principle that the UN should not be unduly dependent on any one member to finance its operations. Thus, there is a “ceiling” rate, setting the maximum amount that any member can be assessed for the regular budget. In December 2000, the Assembly revised the scale of assessments in response to pressure from the United States. As part of that revision, the regular budget ceiling was reduced from 25% to 22%. For the least developed countries (LDCs), a ceiling rate of 0.01% is applied. In addition to the ceiling rates, the minimum amount assessed to any member nation (or “floor” rate) is set at 0.001% of the UN budget ($55,120 for the two year budget 2013\u20132014).<\/p>\n A large share of the UN’s expenditure addresses its core mission of peace and security, and this budget is assessed separately from the main organizational budget. The peacekeeping budget for the 2015\u201316 fiscal year was $8.27 billion, supporting 82,318 troops deployed in 15 missions around the world. UN peace operations are funded by assessments, using a formula derived from the regular funding scale that includes a weighted surcharge for the five permanent Security Council members, who must approve all peacekeeping operations. This surcharge serves to offset discounted peacekeeping assessment rates for less developed countries. In 2017, the top eight providers of assessed financial contributions to UN peacekeeping operations were the United States (28.47%), China (10.25%), Japan (9.68%), Germany (6.39%), France (6.28%), United Kingdom (5.77%), Russian Federation (3.99%) and Italy (3.75%).<\/p>\n Special UN programmed not included in the regular budget, such as UNICEF and the World Food Programme, are financed by voluntary contributions from member governments, corporations, and private individuals.<\/p>\n The flag of the United Nations was adopted on December 7, 1946, and consists of the official emblem of the United Nations in white on a blue background.<\/p>\n The emblem’s design is described as:<\/p>\n A map of the world representing an azimuthal equidistant projection<\/a> centred on the North Pole<\/a>, inscribed in a wreath consisting of crossed conventionalized branches of the olive tree, . . . The projection of the map extends to 60 degrees south latitude, and includes five concentric circles.<\/p>\n The olive branches are a symbol for peace, and the world map represents all the people and the countries of the world.<\/p>\n White and blue are the official colors of the United Nations.<\/p>\n The organizers of the 1945 United Nations Conference on International Organization in San Francisco, California wanted an insignia that could be made into a pin to identify delegates. United States Secretary of State Edward Stettinius, Jr.<\/a> was chairperson of the U.S. delegation, and realized that a temporary design might become the permanent symbol of the United Nations. He formed a committee headed by Oliver Lundquist<\/a> that developed a design consisting of a world map surrounded by leaves from a design created by Donal McLaughlin<\/a>.<\/p>\n The blue that appears in the background of the insignia was chosen to be “the opposite of red, the war colour”, although the exact shade has never been officially specified by the United Nations. The original color the group chose in 1945 was a gray blue that differs from the current United Nations flag. The globe used in the original design was an azimuthal projection focused on the North Pole with the United States, the host nation of the conference, at the center. The projection that was used cut off portions of the Southern Hemisphere<\/a> at the latitude of Argentina, which was acceptable at the time, as Argentina was not planned to be an original member of the United Nations. The projection was later altered so that no country will be at prominence within the flag. The new logo was now designed so that the globe is bisected in the center by the Prime Meridian<\/a> and the International Date Line<\/a>.<\/p>\n In 1946, a UNO committee got the task of making a definite design, which was presented December 2, 1946, and adopted by the plenary session of the UNO on December 7, 1946. The earlier version had the globe 90 degrees turned eastward compared with the present flag, which has the Prime Meridian and the International Date Line forming the vertical diameter. According to press statements, the change was made to move North America away from the center of the emblem.<\/p>\n![\"UN](\"https:\/\/www.smoketreemanor.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2019\/05\/UN-Building-in-Manhattan-300x154.jpg\" "\\"\\"")
History:<\/h2>\n
Background:<\/h3>\n
![\"League](\"https:\/\/www.smoketreemanor.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2019\/05\/League-of-Nations-Membership-300x191.png\" "\\"\\"")
1942 “Declaration of United Nations” by the Allies of World War II:<\/h3>\n
![\"United](\"https:\/\/www.smoketreemanor.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2019\/05\/United-Nations-Organization-Sketch-by-Franklin-Roosevelt-260x300.jpg\" "\\"\\"")
![\"Atlantic](\"https:\/\/www.smoketreemanor.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2019\/05\/Atlantic-Charter-Group-300x200.jpg\" "\\"\\"")
Founding:<\/h3>\n
![\"UN](\"https:\/\/www.smoketreemanor.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2019\/05\/UN-in-1945-with-Founding-Members-in-Blue-and-Territories-of-Founding-Members-in-Dark-Blue-300x130.png\" "\\"\\"")
Cold War Era:<\/h3>\n
![\"Dag](\"https:\/\/www.smoketreemanor.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2019\/05\/Dag-Hammarskjold-225x300.jpg\" "\\"\\"")
![\"Current](\"https:\/\/www.smoketreemanor.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2019\/05\/Current-Member-States-by-Date-of-Admission-300x133.png\" "\\"\\"")
Post-Cold War:<\/h3>\n
![\"Boutros](\"https:\/\/www.smoketreemanor.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2019\/05\/Boutros-Boutros-Ghali.jpg\" "\\"\\"")
![\"Eleanor](\"https:\/\/www.smoketreemanor.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2019\/05\/Eleanor-Roosevelt-with-Universal-Declaration-of-HumanRights-in-Spanish-300x237.png\" "\\"\\"")
Structure:<\/h2>\n
![\"UN](\"https:\/\/www.smoketreemanor.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2019\/05\/UN-Organizational-Chart-300x213.png\" "\\"\\"")
General Assembly:<\/h3>\n
![\"General](\"https:\/\/www.smoketreemanor.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2019\/05\/General-Assembly-Hall-300x186.jpg\" "\\"\\"")
Security Council:<\/h3>\n
![\"Security](\"https:\/\/www.smoketreemanor.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2019\/05\/Security-Council-Chambers-300x225.jpg\" "\\"\\"")
UN Secretariat:<\/h3>\n
![\"Kofi](\"https:\/\/www.smoketreemanor.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2019\/05\/Kofi-Annan-225x300.jpg\" "\\"\\"")
International Court of Justice:<\/h3>\n
![\"International](\"https:\/\/www.smoketreemanor.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2019\/05\/International-Court-of-Justice-300x224.jpg\" "\\"\\"")
Economic and Social Council:<\/h3>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.smoketreemanor.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2019\/05\/UN-Economic-and-Social-Council-300x225.jpg\" "\\"\\"")
<\/p>\nSpecialized Agencies:<\/h3>\n
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![\"Global](\"https:\/\/www.smoketreemanor.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2019\/05\/Global-Smallpox-Eradication-Directors-Signal-Success-300x236.jpg\" "\\"\\"")
Membership:<\/h2>\n
![\"Map](\"https:\/\/www.smoketreemanor.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2019\/05\/Map-of-UN-Member-States-300x154.png\" "\\"\\"")
Objectives:<\/h2>\n
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![\"UN](\"https:\/\/www.smoketreemanor.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2019\/05\/UN-Forces-Training-Exercise-in-Chile-300x195.jpg\" "\\"\\"")
Funding:<\/h2>\n
\n
![\"UN](\"https:\/\/www.smoketreemanor.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2019\/05\/UN-Budget-Over-Time-300x204.jpg\" "\\"\\"")
The Flag:<\/h2>\n
![\"United](\"https:\/\/www.smoketreemanor.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2019\/05\/United-Nations-Flag-300x200.png\" "\\"\\"")
Design:<\/h3>\n
History:<\/h3>\n
![\"United](\"https:\/\/www.smoketreemanor.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2019\/05\/United-Nations-Emblem-300x255.png\" "\\"\\"")
Use:<\/h3>\n