Declaration by United Nations
The Declaration by United Nations was the main treaty that formalized the Allies of World War II and was signed by 47 national governments between 1942 and 1945. On 1 January 1942, during the Arcadia Conference, the Allied "Big Four"—the United States, the United Kingdom, the Soviet Union, and China—signed a short document which later came to be known as the United Nations Declaration, and the next day the representatives of 22 other nations added their signatures.
Declaration by United Nations
聯合國共同宣言
联合国共同宣言
Liánhéguó gòngtóng xuānyán
Liánhéguó gòngtóng xuānyán
Декларация Объединённых Наций
Deklaratsiya Ob"yedinonnykh Natsiy
The other original signatories on the next day (2 January 1942) were the four dominions of the British Commonwealth (Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and South Africa); eight European governments-in-exile (Belgium, Czechoslovakia, Greece, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, and Yugoslavia); nine countries in the Americas (Costa Rica, Cuba, Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras, Nicaragua, and Panama); and one non-independent government, the British-appointed Government of India.
The Declaration by United Nations became the basis of the United Nations (UN), which was formalized in the UN Charter, signed by 50 countries on 26 June 1945.
Background[edit]
The Allies of World War II first expressed their principles and vision for the post-World War II world in the Declaration of St. James's Palace agreed at the First Inter-Allied Conference in June 1941.[1][2] The Anglo-Soviet Agreement was signed in July 1941 forming a military alliance between the United Kingdom and the Soviet Union.[3][4] The two main principles of these agreements, a commitment to the war and renunciation of a separate peace, formed the basis for the later Declaration by United Nations.[5]
The Atlantic Charter was agreed a month later between Britain and the United States, to which the other Allies, now including the Soviet Union, agreed to adhere at the Second Inter-Allied Conference in September.[6][7]
Adoption[edit]
The Declaration was officially signed on 1 January 1942 by the Big Four —the United States, the United Kingdom, the Soviet Union, and China—followed the next day by representatives of 22 other governments. The term "United Nations" became synonymous during the war with the Allies and was considered to be the formal name that they were fighting under.[15][16][17]
The Declaration by United Nations became the basis of the modern United Nations.[18] By the end of the war, 21 other states had acceded to the declaration, including the Philippines (a non-independent, US commonwealth at the time), France, every Latin American state except Argentina,[19] and the various independent states of the Middle East and Africa. Although most of the minor Axis powers had switched sides and joined the United Nations as co-belligerents against Germany by the end of the war, they were not allowed to accede to the declaration. Occupied Denmark did not sign the declaration, but because of the vigorous resistance after 1943, and because the Danish ambassador Henrik Kauffmann had expressed the adherence to the declaration of all free Danes, Denmark was nonetheless invited among the allies in the San Francisco Conference in March 1945.[5][20]