Resource Message for the United Nations' Day Celeb

Tomorrow marks the official coming to existence of what we now call the United Nations Organization. It is the world leaders’ effort to cushion the effects of the Second World War as the casualties had been poorly managed by the League of Nations. All over the world, this day is being celebrated as the world’s peace day, as it had been declared to be the day of celebrating the birth of regulation of global issues. It was even declared in 1971, 24 years after it had been established, that UN member states observe this day as a public holiday by the United Nations Resolution 2782. We display flags of countries; we do programs, meetings, discussions and exhibits about the achievements of this union of the nations.

As we all know by now, the United Nations is an organization aiming to regulate international affairs, ultimately leading to world peace. Who wouldn’t want that, shall we ask?

In 1945, toward the end of the war, the League of Nations had been abolished to give way to the founding of the United Nations Organization to stop the wars between countries and provide communication between the states. It has subdivisions that serve as arms and legs in executing programs.

To encourage visualization, the heads had to come up with an emblem, a symbol into which people would look to for reference. And so on October 1946, they came up with this design which showed the most of the world on a flat disc. Later, they added Antarctica, which was not included in the first emblem. The Greenwich Meridian was placed at the center and was accepted by the members. More and more designs came, and these designs became simpler and more monochromatic until a level of simplicity and dignity had been attained.

On October 20, 1947, the resolution 167 (II) was released to put the emblem on a flag together with the formulation of a flag code which was published on December 19 of the same year. Amendments were done in November of 1952 and a complete revision on New Year’s Day of 1967.

To house UN meetings and offices, the United States congress decided to request that the UN offices be built in the country. New York City reigned supreme among the choices of location and construction went on in 1949 and 1950. The land was purchased with an 8.5 million – dollar donation from John D. Rockefeller, Jr. and was opened on January 9, 1951.

Aside from New York, major agencies under UN based themselves in Geneva, the Hague, Vienna, Nairobi and other places.

The idea for the future United Nations as an international organization emerged in declarations signed at the wartime Allied conferences in Moscow (Russia) and in Tehran (Iran)in 1943. From August to October 1944, representatives of France, the Republic of China, the United Kingdom, the United States, and the USSR met to elaborate plans at the Dumbarton Oaks Conference in Washington, D.C.


Those and latter talks produced proposals outlining the purposes of the United Nations Organization, its membership and organs, as well as arrangements to maintain international peace and security and international economic and social cooperation. Governments and private citizens worldwide discussed and debated these proposals.

At the Yalta Conference it was agreed that membership would be open to nations that had joined the Allies by 1 March 1945. Brazil, Syria and a number of other countries qualified for membership by declarations of war on either Germany or Japan in the first three months of 1945 - in some cases retroactively.

Other signs included flags of other member states and a few patches, all symbolic of the essence of the union of the nations of the world.

The United Nations continues to cater to the needs of the world like the development of human rights, economies, decolonializations, health and education. The prevention of the occurrence of wars is one of their strongest advocacies. But then, there had been wars over the years, but none so far had been elevated to world war status.

The organization’s main advocacies include children’s welfare; in which developed and developing countries seem to have little to no time for. Children would be left homeless and sleep on the streets. They would be underfed, and undereducated. The future is dim for them, and as they were born and were raised is the streets, it is likely that they’d also die in the streets, robbed of the chance to prove themselves to the world.

Together with, but not totally in accordance to children, is education. That is said because the United Nations doesn’t just appeal the need for education to the young, but to the matured but uneducated people as well. It is a big job which includes raising awareness on healthcare and sanitation, family and lifestyle, and not just within school instruction.

Hunger and malnutrition result from poverty, often caused by colonialization and war. This is mostly seen in African countries, which had been divided into the hands of European powers in the late 1800s and early 1900s. It is there therefore that hunger and poverty is most evident. These countries had been ripped off of its riches, and the people’s morale is very low because of slavery and ethnical/tribal persecution as seer in the feature film “Tears of the Sun.” Diseases also abound due to lack of awareness in hygiene and healthcare. The United Nations’ Millennium Campaign aims to change this.

Peace, as mentioned earlier, is the UN’s primary advocacy, in the face of the raging war the time the organization was founded. But the problem did not end when the war ended. There are countries and cities to rebuild because of destruction of infrastructure and people to feed because of the destruction of livelihood and industry. As depicted by the bird with a twig in its beak, like Noah’s post-flood time, this is a symbol of hope especially to the war-ravaged countries that there still is hope.

Health issues are dictated by a person’s or a people’s way of living. Because of poverty and undereducation, malnourishment and hygienic negligence result in the spreading of very preventable and treatable diseases that cost the life of many of the people in these countries. Without decent shelters, clean water and clean food, people get sick and die. How much more without just shelters, water and food?

HIV or AIDS is still one of the most effective killers today. But the disease is defined by belief. There are hearsays as to guaranteed cures and sure risks to being infected with the virus, but a lot of people around the world do not base their beliefs and fears on the disease on fact.

Children’s Human Rights is the most important human rights advocacy in the world. Childhood displays a lot of innocence and trusting, and anything done against the best interests of a child is punished. And so the Convention on the Rights of the Child is adopted by the United Nations Assembly in 1989.

No man is an island, we say. The same is true with the union of the nations. In time of difficulty and suffering from emergencies especially of natural disasters, the United Nations advocate to help the affected countries with financial and in-kind help by supplying goods and money to help the victims rebuild their lives with. The United Nations were there after Hurricane Katrina destroyed the US and many other countries. The Pakistani earthquake left people homeless after the country suffered from landslides. Just after Ondoy and Pepeng, and certainly even after Ramil, the Philippines enjoys a steady stream of assistance from all over the world, not just coming from Filipino communities in different countries but from the locals as well.

The world has natural reactions to human actions. Intense heat not reflected back to the sun due to thinning ozone layer comes to the earth and melts the polar ice. Water level increases and disasters abound. In short, Climate Change. This is one of the biggest environmental issues that threaten global survival today. The UN closely monitors this together with the world’s environmental organizations as it would affect first and most the developing countries especially with their poor and still developing disaster management programs.

Women comprise more than half of the world’s population. But they seem to belong to the minority when it comes to global treatment. Violence, illiteracy and inequality are some of the toughest issues they face because of their gender.

The United Nations struggles to address the problems of the world many at a time. There aren’t anyway better for them, who also face threats from the very same problems. The feature film Tears of the Sun showcased how a nation can be very unstable within itself, and how the rest of the world, if not watching from the sidelines, reacts to them. There are medical and religious missions on the war areas to offer medical and moral support and doctors from all over the world come to help the sick and the hungry. American soldiers come to rescue the afflicted, and neighboring countries provide shelter for the refugees.

The United Nations – how helpful to the world’s welfare an organization can it be? What can we do to help? Wouldn’t it be better, make the planet cleaner and more peaceful, if we start the change from within to avoid cleaning up our mess after something bad already happened? Or maybe we can work hand-in-hand in order prevent bad things happening and if something does happen, the people above us, that is the world leaders and the United Nations would have less things and problems to think about.