United Nations Web Site Updated

Happy Monday, for today's afternoon break why not check out the new United Nations web site? The new interface is designed to provide easier access to all the UN information you are used to finding on the old site. Here are some of the features:

• In a bar across the top is a list of some of the top issues the UN works with: Peace and Security, Development, Human Rights, Humanitarian Affairs, and International Law. I like this setup because you no longer need to know who deals with these issues, you can instead click on these topics and get links directly to those organizations and news pages. My one complaint would be that Human Rights and Humanitarian Affairs are two very related topics and for people looking for information on those areas they will have to go to both pages.
• The In Focus feature on the right lets you link directly to UN news on a particular issue that is in the news. For example, right now you can see news on Influenza A(H1N1), Situation in the Middle East, and Climate Change. Note this is not news from all sources, just UN information.
  
• There is an RSS feed to recent news from the UN news center, which covers all the UN organizations.
• Finally, there is an update to the Global Issues on the UN Agenda, now simply called Global Issues. I have encouraged people for years to use this resource to find out the UN organizations that are working on a particular topic. The redesign of this resource now includes an overview of the topic, such as Disarmament, as well as links to the UN agencies working on that issue.

I hope you have fun playing around in this new design, please leave comments on features you like or dislike on this entry. If you want more UN resources, check out the library's guide.