Delving deep into global issues

Worldly experience

“The conference allows students to re-create the functioning of the international UN conferences, where the youngsters represent the delegates of various countries in the UN, General Assembly, Economic and Social Council, and Security Council,” said Kanishka K, one of the organisers.

Most of the students, with a keen interest in global affairs, really enjoyed the conference and found it rather interesting. “We don’t know if we will be able to hold such posts in future but such conferences helps us get a good feel and a better understanding of how the UN functions,” said Shruthi, one of the students.

This year, the conference consisted of three committees — Security Council, Economic and Social Council and GA-ESCAPED (Emergency Special Committee Addressing the Prevention of an Environmental Disaster), a one-of-its-kind committee. The entire session was based in the year 2015.

“This year’s General Assembly was a crisis committee in itself and the delegates were required to react to the primary crisis, which indicated that the entire world was in a grave situation. They were supposed to provide unanimous resolutions to it,” explained a student.

On the first day, the discussions were focussed on environment, temperature rise, increasing sea levels, ozone layer depletion, and food, water and energy scarcity, among others in the year 2015. The Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) on the other hand had two topics on its agenda — ‘Individual freedom in the war against terror’ and ‘Bridging the technological divide between developed and developing countries’.

The second day presented a new crisis to the ECOSOC which the delegates resolved successfully. The delegates were tested on their presence of mind during the press conferences by the Secretary General.

“It was a successful conference and the most interesting aspect of it was the fact that throughout the conference, all the procedures that followed were according to the sessions in the United Nations Organisation, allowing the students to get a real feel,” added Kanishka.