Secretariat

The Secretariat services the other principal organs and administers programs and policies. It is administered by the Secretary-General , and he appoints the staff.

The Secretariat is responsible for many U.N. duties including administering peacekeeping operations, surveying economic and social issues, and preparing studies on human rights and development. It is also in charge of the press releases and interpretation. There is a staff of about 9,000 people from 170 countries. These international civil servants take an oath to answer only to the U.N.

SEARCHING FOR SECRETARIAT DOCUMENTS

The Annual Report presented to the General Assembly is the most important document that eminates from the Secretariat. It is a kind of yearly address of the Secretary-General.

ANNUAL REPORT

About This Resource
The Annual Report is Supplement 1 to the Official Records of the General Assembly. Online, you can search under U.N. Doc Symbol A/number of session/1
Digital	Paper
UNBISnet: has full-text of back to 1985 (41st session).	Official Records of the General Assembly from 1946 to 1990. Look for supplement 1.

United Nations Bibliographic Information System (UNBISNET) has bibliographic records going back to 1979, and full-text back to 1992. However, they are constantly digitizing more older records. Use "st" in UN Doc. Symbol field to search for General Assembly Documents.

AccessUN , an index of U.N. material back to 1944, allows you to search by organ. If you put in st for Document Number , only Secreriat documents will be retrieved. (See AccessUN instructions for more search information and Document Type for more information about U.N. documents).

Subsidiary and ad hoc bodies that report to the Secretariat, for example Office of Legal Affairs and Department of Public Information. In the U.N. Organizational Chart , click on the body's name to be taken to its website.