Everything about Unrra totally explained
The
United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration (UNRRA) was proposed to the
United States Congress by president
Franklin Delano Roosevelt on
June 9,
1943 to provide relief to areas liberated from
Axis powers after
World War II. Roosevelt had already obtained the approval of the governments of the
United Kingdom, the
Soviet Union, and
China, and sought to obtain the endorsement of 40 other governments to form the first "United Nations" organization.
UNRRA provided billions of US dollars of rehabilitation aid, and helped about 8 million refugees. It ceased operations in the
DP camps of
Europe in
1947, and in
Asia in
1949, upon which it ceased to exist. Its functions were transferred to several UN agencies, including the
International Refugee Organization.
Founding and authority
The
Agreement for United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration
founding document was signed by 44 countries in the
White House in Washington,
November 9,
1943. UNRRA was headed by a Director-General, and governed by a Council (composed of representatives of all state parties) and a Central Committee (composed of representatives of the
U.S., the
U.K., the dominion of Canada, the
Republic of China, and the
U.S.S.R.). The other countries who signed the agreement included:
Australia,
Belgium,
Bolivia,
Brazil,
Canada,
Chile,
Colombia,
Costa Rica,
Cuba,
Czechoslovakia,
Dominican Republic,
Ecuador,
Egypt,
El Salvador,
Ethiopia, the
French Committee of National Liberation,
Greece,
Guatemala,
Haiti,
Honduras,
Iceland,
India,
Iran,
Iraq,
Liberia,
Luxembourg,
Mexico,
Netherlands,
New Zealand,
Norway,
Panama,
Paraguay,
Peru,
Philippines,
Poland,
South Africa,
Uruguay,
Venezuela, and
Yugoslavia.
Although the UNRRA was called a "United Nations" agency, it was established prior to the founding of the
United Nations. The explanation for this is that the term "United Nations" was used at the time to refer to the
Allies of World War II, having been originally coined for that purpose by
Roosevelt in 1942.
Although initially restricted by its constitution to render aid only to nationals from the United Nations (the Allies), this was in response to pleas from Jewish organizations who were concerned with the fate of surviving Jews of German nationality, late in 1944 changed to also include "other persons who have been obliged to leave their country or place of origin or former residence or who have been deported therefrom by action of the enemy because of race, religion or activities' in favor of the United Nations."
Although UNRRA operated in occupied Germany, primarily operating
Displaced persons camps, the organization didn't render assistance to ethnic Germans.
The organization was subject to the authority of the
Supreme Headquarters of the Allied Expeditionary Forces (SHAEF) in Europe and was directed by three Americans during the four years of its existence. Its first director-general was
Herbert Lehman, former governor of New York. He was succeeded in March 1946 by
Fiorello La Guardia, former
mayor of
New York City, who was in turn followed by Major General
Lowell Ward Rooks in early 1947.
The organization also assigned the territory of
Taiwan Island to the control of the Republic of China government after the surrender of
Japan in 1945. The
ROC Army subsequently occupied the area of Taiwan which was where President
Chiang Kai-Shek and his
Kuomintang (Nationalist) government fled after losing the
Chinese Civil War to the
Communists in 1949.
Further Information
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