Databases

  • United Nations Digital Library. (Official Records and maps). This resource replaces the United Nations Dag Hammarskjold library catalog of UN documents (UNBISNET) and includes links to digital versions of official documents and maps. The Digital Library also has catalog entries for non-digitized items that identify the document symbol number, year, etc. See Documents available online.
  • Official Document System Includes born digital documents from 1993, on, and many digitized documents between 1946-1992.

4/26/2023: The Library building at the UN Headquarters in New York is temporarily closed as part of an ongoing maintenance. For the weeks to come, they will not have access to their print collection.

For this reason, the Dag Hammarskjöld Library temporarily suspends on-demand scanning, in-person trainings, and the circulation of print library materials.

If the full text is not available from these two sources, continue to locating documents by symbol number, below.

Locating UN Documents by symbol number

*Please Note: Sales publications are generally not part of the depository collection, however, we may have selected a sales publication individually. To find sales publications, search the library catalog or Worldcat by title. The information below concerns finding UN documents from the depository system.

  1. Identify the symbol number
    • Start with the Dag Hammarskold United Nations Library above to see if the document metadata is available.
    • Or, search the Yearbook of the United Nations.
      The Yearbook provides important background information on issues before the UN, including references to documents by document symbol number. Available online, but there is a significant lag in publishing. Olin Library also has from 1946 - 2009, in hardcopy. [JX1977.A37 Y4 +].  The Yearbook provides important background information on issues before the UN, including references to documents by document symbol number.
    • Or, find a print index that covers the year of interest.
  2. Examine the record to determine whether or not the item is labelled "Official Record" and for the date published. If you don't see "Official Record"  or "sales publication," it's a "masthead" document.
  3. Locate the Document
    • For Official Records, see the "Official Records" section of this guide.
    • For "masthead" documents (i.e. documents that are not labelled Official Record or "sales publication"), or for Official Records that cannot be found in the bound volumes, see: "On Microfiche/Microcard."

A note about document symbol numbers...

Documents are organized by major UN body and document symbol number

Main Body: General Assembly

Symbol numbers begin with:

A/

GAOR

Main Body: Economic and Social Council

Symbol numbers begin with:

E/

ESCOR

Main Body: Security Council

Symbol numbers begin with:

S/PV

S/_/

S/INF.(session number)

SCOR

Secretariat

No symbol numbers

Main Body: Trusteeship Council

Symbol numbers begin with:

TC/

Main Body: Trade and Development Board

Symbol numbers begin with:

TD/B

Please note: For documents that do not appear to have come from one of the main bodies listed above, see Documents from other UN Bodies/Agencies