THE UNITED NATIONS

• It is an international organization whose stated aims include promoting and facilitating cooperation in international law, international security, economic development, social progress, human rights, civil rights, civil liberties, political freedoms, democracy, and the achievement of lasting world peace. 
• United Nations organization designed to maintain international peace and to protect their members from the threat of war. 
• No doubt the United Nations is a multifunctional organization yet its chief function is the maintenance of world peace and security. 
• The stipulation in the UN Charter that membership is open to all “peace loving” countries reaffirms this purpose, as does the charter’s requirement that members “settle their international disputes by peaceful means in such a manner that international peace and security, and justice, are not endangered.’
• In order to perform its significant and foremost role of maintaining peace and security the three major methods employed by the UN are pacific settlement, collective security and preventive diplomacy or peace-keeping. 
• The first two are provided in the UN Charter whereas the third one was invented by its most active secretary-General.
• In 1945 there was no peace to settle the problems of the postwar world.
• In 1947 the Allies made peace treaties with Italy, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria and Finland; in 1951 with Japan; in 1955 with Austria; and not until 1990 with Germany.
• In the summer of 1945 the line between the western democracies and the Soviet Union had still to be drawn.
• At that time most people’s hopes were pinned on the United Nations Organization which, under American auspices, had just been established to guarantee world peace.
• Unlike in 1919, the US now embraced the idea of collective security.

Origin of UNO 

• The United Nations as an international organization has its origins in World War II.
• Since then its aims and activities have expanded to make it the standard international body in the early 21st century.
• US President Franklin Delano Roosevelt first suggested using the name United Nations to refer to the Allies of World War II.
• Roosevelt suggested the term to Winston Churchill who cited Byron’s use of the phrase “united nations” in Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage, which referred to the Allies at the Battle of Waterloo in 1815. 
• Franklin Roosevelt adopted the name and the first official use of the term occurred on January 1, 1942 with the Declaration by the United Nations. During subsequent phases of World War II the Allies used the term United Nations to refer to their alliance.
• In 1945, representatives of 50 countries met in San Francisco at the United Nations Conference on International Organization to draw up the United Nations Charter.
• Those delegates deliberated on the basis of proposals worked out by the representatives of China, the Soviet Union, the United Kingdom and the United States at Dumbarton Oaks, United States in August-October 1944.
• The Charter was signed on 26 June 1945 by the representatives of the 50 countries. Poland, which was Notre presented at the Conference, signed it later and became one of the original 51 Member States.
• The United Nations officially came into existence on 24 October 1945, when the Charter had been ratified by China, France, the Soviet Union, the United Kingdom, and the United States and by a majority of other signatories. United Nations Day is celebrated on 24 October each year.
• The League of Nations formally dissolved itself on 18 April 1946 and transferred its mission to the United Nations. 

History of United Nations Charter

• The United Nations Charter is the treaty that established the United Nations. The following series of events led to the writing of the Charter, and the UN’s founding.

12 June 1941 – The Declaration of St. James’s Palace

• In June 1941, London was the home of nine exiled governments. The great British capital had already seen twenty-two months of war and in the bomb-marked city, afraid sirens wailed all too frequently.
• Practically all Europe had fallen to the Axis and ships on the Atlantic, carrying vital supplies, sank with grim regularity.
• But in London itself and among the Allied governments and peoples, faith in ultimate victory remained unshaken. And, even more, people were looking beyond military victory to the postwar future.

14 August 1941 – The Atlantic Charter

• Two months after the London Declaration came the next step to a world organization, the result of a dramatic meeting between President Roosevelt and Prime Minister Churchill.

1 January 1942 – The Declaration of the United Nations

• Representatives of 26 countries fighting the Rome-Berlin-Tokyo Axis, decide to support the by Signing the Declaration of the United Nations.

1943 – Moscow and Teheran Conference

• Thus by 1943 all the principal Allied nations were committed to outright victory and, thereafter, to an attempt to create a world in which “men in all lands may live out their lives in freedom from fear and want.” 
• But the basis for a world organization had yet to be defined, and such a definition came at the meeting of the Foreign Ministers of Great Britain, the United States and the Soviet Union in October 1943.

1944-1945 – Dumbarton Oaks and Yalta 

• The principles of the world organization-to-be were thus laid down. But it is a long step from defining the principles and purpose of such a body to setting up the structure.
• A blueprint had to be prepared, and it had to be accepted by many nations.

1945 – San Francisco Conference

• Forty-five nations, including the four sponsors, were originally invited to the San Francisco Conference: nations which had declared war on Germany and Japan and had subscribed to the United Nations Declaration. 
• Within three months the charter was ratified by all of the permanent members of the Security Council and by majority of the signatories; and on October 24, 1945, the United Nations formally came into existence.
• This great document contains more than ten thousand words, with 111 Articles divided into 19 chapters.
• The UN charter clearly states the purposes, principles and general nature of this international organization.
• The Charter delineates all the United Nations’ subsequent relationship and programs.

Purposes 

The purposes of the United Nations according to Article 1 of the Charter are:

1. To maintain International Peace and Security:

• The means for achieving this purpose include peaceful settlement of disputes (Charter VI) and collective security (Charter VII) for prevention and removal of threats to the peace or acts of aggression.
• The Security Council is assigned primary duty for peace maintenance but shares this function with the General Assembly and the International Court of Justice.

2. To develop friendly relations among nations:

• Various organs and agencies of the UN provide excellent platform to member states for developing friendly relations among themselves.

3. To cooperate in solving international economic, social, cultural and humanitarian problems and in promoting respect for human rights: 

• The Economic and Social Council is to serve as the major organ for putting this goal in practice with enough support from the General Assembly and from such autonomous international specialized agencies in the economic and social sphere as governments may create and bring into formal relationship with the United Nations.
• Major responsibilities for promoting human rights are assigned to the General Assembly and to the Economic and Social Council.

4. To be a centre for harmonizing the actions of nations in attaining these common ends and more specific goals:

These goals are-

(a) taking appropriate measures to strengthen universal peace,

(b) practicing tolerance and living together in peace as good neighbors; and

(c) establishing justice and respect for international law.