United Nations

General information

The United Nations (UN) is an intergovernmental organisation that was founded in 1945. It is currently made up of 193 Member States. The mission and work of the UN are guided by the purposes and principles contained in its founding Charter. The UN Secretary-General is the head of the UN Secretariat. The Secretary-General represents the organisation and is thus the person people are most familiar with in the organisation.

António Guterres was born in Santos-o-Velho, Lisbon on 30 April 1949. A Portuguese politician, he took office as the ninth Secretary-General of the United Nations on 1 January 2017. Between 1992 and 2002 Guterres was General Secretary of the Partido Socialista (PS), between 1995 and 2002 Prime Minister of Portugal, and from 1999 to 2005 he was President of the Socialist International. Following that, Guterres was the UN's High Commissioner for Refugees between 2005 and 2015.

Further information
United Nations website

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