Reference Text
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Though
the
UN's
primary
mandate
was
peacekeeping,
the
division
between
the
US
and
USSR
often
paralysed
the
organization,
generally
allowing
it
to
intervene
only
in
conflicts
distant
from
the
Cold
War.
(A
notable
exception
was
a
Security
Council
resolution
in
1950
authorizing
a
US-led
coalition
to
repel
the
North
Korean
invasion
of
South
Korea,
passed
in
the
absence
of
the
USSR.)
In
1947,
the
General
Assembly
approved
a
resolution
to
partition
Palestine,
approving
the
creation
of
the
state
of
Israel.
Two
years
later,
Ralph
Bunche,
a
UN
official,
negotiated
an
armistice
to
the
resulting
conflict.
In
1956,
the
first
UN
peacekeeping
force
was
established
to
end
the
Suez
Crisis;
owever,
the
UN
was
unable
to
intervene
against
the
USSR's
simultaneous
invasion
of
Hungary
following
that
country's
revolution.
In
1960,
the
UN
deployed
United
Nations
Operation
in
the
Congo
(UNOC),
the
largest
military
force
of
its
early
decades,
to
bring
order
to
the
breakaway
State
of
Katanga,
restoring
it
to
the
control
of
the
Democratic
Republic
of
the
Congo
by
1964.
While
travelling
to
meet
rebel
leader
Moise
Tshombe
during
the
conflict,
Dag
Hammarskjöld,
often
named
as
one
of
the
UN's
most
effective
Secretaries-General,
died
in
a
plane
crash;
months
later
he
was
posthumously
awarded
the
Nobel
Peace
Prize.
In
1964,
Hammarskjold's
successor,
U
Thant,
deployed
the
UN
Peacekeeping
Force
in
Cyprus,
which
would
become
one
of
the
UN's
longest-running
peacekeeping
missions.
With
the
spread
of
decolonization
in
the
1960s,
the
organization's
membership
saw
an
influx
of
newly
independent
nations.
In
1960
alone,
17
new
states
joined
the
UN,
16
of
them
from
Africa.
On
25
October
1971,
with
opposition
from
the
United
States,
but
with
the
support
of
many
Third
World
nations,
the
mainland,
communist
People's
Republic
of
China
was
given
the
Chinese
seat
on
the
Security
Council
in
place
of
the
Republic
of
China
that
occupied
Taiwan;
the
vote
was
widely
seen
as
a
sign
of
waning
US
influence
in
the
organization.
Third
World
nations
organized
into
the
Group
of
77
coalition
under
the
leadership
of
Algeria,
which
briefly
became
a
dominant
power
at
the
UN.
In
1975,
a
bloc
comprising
the
USSR
and
Third
World
nations
passed
a
resolution,
over
strenuous
US
and
Israeli
opposition,
declaring
Zionism
to
be
racism;
the
resolution
was
repealed
in
1991,
shortly
after
the
end
of
the
Cold
War.
With
an
increasing
Third
World
presence
and
the
failure
of
UN
mediation
in
conflicts
in
the
Middle
East,
Vietnam,
and
Kashmir,
the
UN
increasingly
shifted
its
attention
to
its
ostensibly
secondary
goals
of
economic
development
and
cultural
exchange.
By
the
1970s,
the
UN
budget
for
social
and
economic
development
was
far
greater
than
its
peacekeeping
budget.
Though
the
UN's
primary
mandate
was
peacekeeping,
the