Charter of the United Nations

The 1945 treaty establishing the United Nations, defining its principal organs and setting out the rights and obligations of member states.

United Nations Security Council: The UN organ responsible for maintaining international peace and security, with authority to adopt binding decisions. Articles 24–26 assign it primary responsibility for peace and security.
United Nations Conference on International Organization: The 1945 San Francisco conference at which delegates negotiated and signed the UN Charter. Its delegates finalized the treaty between April and June 1945.
Sovereign equality: The principle that states possess equal legal status despite differences in power or resources. The Charter names sovereign equality as a foundation of the organization.
United Nations: An intergovernmental organization founded in 1945 to maintain peace, promote cooperation, and advance human rights. The Charter is the organization’s constitutive treaty and defines its framework.
United Nations General Assembly: The UN’s deliberative organ in which all member states are represented. The Charter grants each member a seat and defines the Assembly’s powers and voting.
Dumbarton Oaks Conference: The 1944 conference where China, the Soviet Union, the United Kingdom, and the United States drafted proposals for a postwar organization. Its proposals provided the negotiating blueprint for much of the Charter.
Collective security: A system in which states coordinate to deter or respond to aggression against international peace. The Charter makes collective security a central purpose and assigns enforcement roles.
International human rights law: The body of international rules protecting the rights and freedoms of individuals. The Charter made human rights promotion a stated purpose of the UN.
Article 2(4) of the UN Charter: The Charter provision prohibiting states from threatening or using force against another state’s territorial integrity or political independence. It establishes the central prohibition on interstate force.
Yalta Conference: The February 1945 meeting of Franklin D. Roosevelt, Winston Churchill, and Joseph Stalin to coordinate Allied policy. Its agreement on Security Council voting cleared a major obstacle to the Charter negotiations.

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