# Admission to the United Nations (14 December 1955)

URL: https://allhistories.com/albania/timeline/1955-admission-to-the-united-nations
Location: New York
Themes: Treaties & Law

Albania's applications to join the United Nations had been blocked since 1946, mainly by Western states that pointed to the Corfu Channel dispute and the absence of free elections. The Soviet Union in turn vetoed candidates backed by the West, and for several years no new members were admitted. In December 1955 the deadlock was broken by a compromise between the superpowers, and on 14 December 1955 sixteen states, including Albania, Bulgaria, Hungary, Romania, Italy, Austria, Portugal and Spain, were admitted together. Albania subsequently joined UN agencies, becoming a member of UNESCO in 1958 and of the Food and Agriculture Organization in 1973. The UN became one of Albania's few windows onto the world during its decades of isolation. From the 1960s Albania sponsored the annual resolution to seat the People's Republic of China, which succeeded in 1971 as General Assembly Resolution 2758, and in May 1990 Secretary-General Javier Pérez de Cuéllar's visit to Tirana signalled the country's reopening. For many years Albania's UN delegation in New York was one of the few places where its diplomats could meet Western counterparts, even though it had no relations with the United States or the United Kingdom.

## Why it matters
UN membership gave the isolated communist state international recognition and a platform for its diplomacy.

Ruler at the Time: [Haxhi Lleshi](https://allhistories.com/albania/rulers/haxhi-lleshi)

Chairman of the Council of Ministers of Albania: Mehmet Shehu (Party of Labour of Albania)
First Secretary of the Communist Party of Albania / Party of Labour of Albania: Enver Hoxha (Party of Labour of Albania)

## Sources
- [Wikipedia — Albania and the United Nations](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albania_and_the_United_Nations)
- [United Nations — Member States](https://www.un.org/en/about-us/member-states)
- [Wikipedia — Communist Albania (period overview)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/People%27s_Socialist_Republic_of_Albania)