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84.

PREFACE
TO THE GUIDE ON PALAIS DES NATIONS

August 2000

T he Palais is today the largest centre for conference diplomacy in

the world. It hosts around 8000 meetings each year for which
some 80,000 people from every corner of globe travel to Geneva
to attend. Geneva has a long history of attracting foreigners; for centuries it has
been a city with a strongly international identity. It was therefore a natural
home for the headquarters of the League of Nations, set up after the
devastation of the First World War with the vision of ending conflict and
creating a more stable world. The design of the Palais, with its extraordinary
cathedral-like proportions, reflects the scale of this dream. I know of no other
building which captures better the aspirations of international diplomacy in the
twentieth century.

But its 1930s art deco splendour also evokes a deeply disturbing period for
Europe which saw the rise of fascism across the continent and the failure of the
international community, including the League of Nations, to prevent a return
to war. In all, the Palais des Nations was the operational headquarters for the
League of Nations for only four years before the Palais was closed for the
duration of the Second World War, after which the League itself was dissolved.

Although the reputation of the League of Nations was scarred by its
inability to prevent the Second World War, it nonetheless achieved significant
successes in conflict prevention during the 1920s. It arbitrated in a dispute over
the Aaland Islands which Finland and Sweden both claimed; it negotiated
Greece's withdrawal from Bulgaria in 1925; and it rejected Turkey's claim to
the Iraqi city of Mosul. The League also resolved disputes in South America

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