On 24 October, more than 300 iconic monuments, buildings, museums, bridges and other landmarks in more than 60 countries around the world, including the headquarters of the Economic Commission in Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) in Santiago, Chile, considered as an icon of the modern Latin American architecture, will be lit up blue to commemorate UN Day and the 70th anniversary of the United Nations.
World famous landmarks from Australia’s Sydney Opera House to the Great Pyramids of Giza in Egypt, from the statue of Christ the Redeemer in Rio de Janeiro to the Empire State Building in New York, will be lit blue, the official color of the UN. Other participants include Russia’s Hermitage Museum, the ancient city of Petra in Jordan, the Leaning Tower of Pisa in Italy, Edinburgh Castle in the United Kingdom and the Alhambra in Spain, among many others.
“I am grateful our Member States are showing such strong enthusiasm in marking 70 years of UN support for peace, development and human rights,” said UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon. “By turning the world UN Blue for a day, we can light the way to a better tomorrow.”
The global celebration will kick off in New Zealand and then Australia with the lighting of the Sydney Opera House at dusk, and from there a wave of UN Blue will move across countries and continents as monuments around the world take part in the international event. United Nations Headquarters in New York will light up for two nights, beginning 23 October when the annual UN Day concert will be held, and concluding on 24 October.
ECLAC’s building in Santiago, Chile, will be light up blue on 23, 24 and 25 October at night. “By participating in this campaign, ECLAC reaffirms its commitment to the work for inclusive development with equality, as well as for the promotion of peace and human rights in Latin America and the Caribbean and in the world,” ECLAC Executive Secretary Alicia Bárcena stated.
ECLAC’s headquarters, opened in 1966, was inspired by the architecture of French artist Le Corbusier and is characterized by its visible concrete construction, in addition to varying volumes and the combination of elements that allude to Latin American history and art.
It is considered an emblematic landmark of Modern Architecture and included in the DOCOMOMO’s (International Committee for the documentation and conservation of buildings, sites and monuments of the Modern movement) watch-dog's list, as a heritage of this architectural movement in view of its innovative design concepts and novel structural model.
More information is available at www.cepal.org.
Any queries should be sent to ECLAC’s Public Information Unit.
E-mail: prensa@cepal.org ; Telephone: (56 2) 2210 2040.
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For the full list of participating monuments and further information, please contact:
Andi Gitow, Executive Producer, Department of Public Information: gitow@un.org; Tel: +1 (917) 367 3012 and Jeffrey Brez, Chief of NGO Relations, Advocacy, and Special Events, Department of Public of Information: brez@un.org; Tel:+1 (212) 963 8070.
More information on “Turn the World UN Blue” and other UN70 global activities and celebrations can be found at ://www.un.org/un70/en.
This global event will be covered extensively on social media using the hashtag #UNBlue in addition to our year-long hashtag #UN70 and shared with the UN’s millions of followers on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, Weibo, Flickr and more. Photos and videos of UN Blue landmarks around the world will be available to media outlets via Flickr (://j.mp/UNBluePhotos) and UNIFEED (://www.unmultimedia.org/tv/unifeed/).
