New York City is home to the headquarters of the United Nations, which opened there in 1952.
The UN headquarters occupies an international zone on the east side of Manhattan, overlooking the East River. The complex includes the General Assembly Building, the Secretariat Building, the Conference Building, and the Dag Hammarskjöld Library. Although the site is in New York City, it is treated as international territory under an agreement with the United States.
The headquarters was formally inaugurated in 1952, after the organization had temporarily operated from locations including London and Lake Success, New York. The complex was designed by an international team of architects led by Wallace K. Harrison. Geneva, Vienna, and Nairobi host major UN offices, which is why they are sometimes mistaken for the organization’s main headquarters; the principal headquarters remains in New York.