The visit of the Nation's Palace in Geneva

The visit of Nations Palace : unforgetable !

We propose you to visit the Palais des Nations through our narrative and of to show you our point of view on this international organization . What is the UNO's fonction ? What are different rooms of the UNO ? How do conferences take place ? What is the UNO's story ? So many questions, and answers are in this article.

Friday, January 8th, we went at Geneva to visit the UNO, we began by the Palais des Nations. It is the UNO's European headquarter and it contains 35 meeting rooms where 8 000 meetings take place each year among which 600 very important conferences. It was built in 1929 for the League of Nations, which aim was to preserve peace between countries. But, after its failure of World War II, it was disbanded and changed into the United Nations Organization. The building has two wings : an old one, used by the League of Nations, and a new one built for UNO.

The room XIX is a medium-sized meeting room. Diplomatic conferences take place here, where politicians of all nations debate between them. They are placed in alphabetical order, from Afghanistan to Zimbabwe. They make understood thanks to interpreters who tell them into earpiece. But there are even so six work languages : English, French, Chinese, Russian, Spanish and Arabic. In spite, English language stays the tongue which is the most used to communicate. We were able to notice that seats were very comfortable, like for all other pieces that we visited.

The room XX is the Human rights room and of Civilizations alliance. It has like particularity its atypical ceiling. It was created by a Spanish artist, Miquel Barcelo, in 2008. What is weird that's that its ceiling is not smooth like we have habit to see it. It is compound of many stalactites. When you enter in this room, we can see that the ceiling presents bluish colors. But, when you go to the left, you can see that the ceiling begins to have orangy colors. The artist wanted to make a methaphore : the solution of one problem can change in accordance with the perspective. We have found this metaphore very talking because it's true that, according to our point of view, the solution can vary and it can have consequences on the future. It's all the more true when it is question of decisions which can influence the future of a country or of the world.

The third room we visited is Coucil Chamber. IN that room, meetings more politic and sensitive take place. The last meeting our guide saw take place in this room concerned the Syria. There was two, in1988, negociations between Iran and Irak. Walls and ceiling are covered of vast frescos where technologic, scientific, social, medical progress are drawn. On the ceiling there are five giants raising the fist. They represent the five close continents. On one of the walls, there is a fresco where a man holds out a child with his arms. Our guide said us that this picture represented the wish that a child doesn't know the war. He said that himself represented this child and we represented him too. His speech really touched us because we saw he felt concerned and he was proud of never have known war.

The Assembly Hall is the bigest meeting room of the Palais des Nations. It have a capacity of 2 000 people. The bigest conferences take place in it. They are broadcasted live by cameras placed in height all the long of walls. There is special locations for interpreters who are placed behind big panes. On the back wall, there is the UNO's symbol. It's a planisphere seen from North Pole, like that, all countries are equal, the planisphere is surrounded by bay sheets representing peace. The UNO has for main aims to preserve peace and to attend to Human's equality and to respect of their rights all around the world. Unfortunately the task is hard and some countries stay at war, continue to conserve inequalities or still certain people take advantage of their power or of their authority on other people. Without talk of all murders commited on innocent people on the pretext that they have do such or such things, without they are really judged by an impartial justice.

And it's very praising objective that the UNO settled but it is very far to be accomplished.