Difference Between UN Security Council and UN General Assembly
The General Assembly of UN and Security Council are the two principal bodies of the United Nations, who are an international organization created after the Second World War in 1945. The United Nations was born to occur of the League of Nations which was formed by countries which opposes Nazi Germany and Japan. The UN has a main aim of solving matters between member countries in peaceful and avoiding wars. The UN has a lot of work to achieve auxiliary organizations in different parts of the world. The six important bodies of the UN are as follows:
– General Assembly
– Security Council
– Economic and Social Council
– Secretariat
– International Court of Justice
– UN Trusteeship Council
There are many other important agencies working on behalf of the UN, some of them are the World Health Organization (WHO), World Food Program (WFP) and United Nations Children’s Emergency Fund (UNICEF).
UN Security Council
This is perhaps the most important organs of the UN as it performs the duty of maintaining peace and security in the world. The UN Charter gave the right to the Security Council to conduct peacekeeping missions in war-torn countries. It is also allowed to put physical and economic sanctions against members making mistakes. The Security Council can even launch military action against any of its member, if circumstances are extreme. All powers of the Security Council conferred with its five permanent members are the United States, the United Kingdom, China, France and Russia. Members of SC are the headquarters of the UN in New York so they can take any emergency meeting at any time. Apart from these five permanent members, there are 15 non-permanent members of SC with a 2-year term and are elected from among the member states.
The special feature of SC is its veto system by which each permanent member has veto power. This means that it can prevent the adoption of a proposal using its veto power. According to the UN Charter, SC may intervene in any situation that may give rise to the international dispute or friction.
UN General Assembly
This is one of the principal organs of the UN and includes all member states. There are 192 member states in the UN. It is mainly involved in the implementation of the UN budget, appointing non-permanent members to the Security Council and make recommendations to the UN of its various organs and agencies. These are known as General Assembly resolutions. The vote in the General Assembly takes place in a number of issues such as expulsion or admission of members, election of members in different organs, budgetary considerations and so on. All recommendations of the General Assembly have passed with two third majority of each nation has one vote only. The General Assembly may make recommendations on all issues except the peace and security which is the domain of the Security Council.
The difference between the Security Council and General Assembly
It is clear that both the Security Council that the General Assembly are important organs of the United Nations with both achieving the various functions. They are similar in the sense that both work for the same purpose that the UN must prevent wars than disputes between member states. They are also similar in the sense that both are under the direction of the Secretary General of the United Nations. Yet there are many differences.