ABSTRACT
As we have seen in Chapter 2 above,1 the creation of the United Nations in 1945 was the second attempt at establishing a universal international organization with the main purpose of maintaining peace by a system of collective security. The emergence of differences between the Soviet Union and Western powers, and the Cold War, however, soon removed the basis for cooperation in the new organization between the founding mem bers. The operation of the United Nations became even more complicated with the later admission of a large number of new states following the process of decolonization. It was only after the end of the Cold War that a new scenario of world order with a different role for the UN seemed to emerge, particularly in view of the firm international response to the aggression committed by Iraq against Kuwait in the Second Gulf War (1990-1), the unprecedented proliferation of various types of UN peace keeping operations, and other forms of UN Security Council activism.2 Meanwhile, a more sober view has come to prevail.
