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China and the UN Charter, 1945

Posted: September 5th, 2017 | No Comments »

Here’s a little fact I did not know – China was the first country to sign the UN Charter on June 1 1945 in San Francisco. As it was deemed that China had been the first allied country to fall victim to fascist and militarist aggression they were accorded the honour of going first. Wellington Koo signed the document using a traditional Chinese calligraphy brush. Behind him stands PC Carson Chang (this photo has an arrow behind him for some reason), the playwright who became a  diplomat and introduced ideas of Confucianism into the diplomatic world and the UN. Both great diplomats (Koo of course signed the UN Charter but had previously, correctly, refused to sign the Versailles Peace Treaty at the end of WW1).

there’s a video clip of the Chinese signing here

 

 



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