Year 13 Keller pupil and HARMUN Secretary General Amy reports on the recent Harrow-hosted MUN conference which welcomed pupils from around Hong Kong and beyond.
Model United Nations (MUN) is an extra-curricular activity where students around the world have the chance to learn more about international relations, diplomacy and enhance their debating skills.
Every week, Harrow International School Hong Kong holds an MUN session as part of its Super-Curriculum programme, where pupils can prepare for upcoming MUN Conferences in other local schools, or for prestigious conferences held overseas, such as THIMUN. Pupils who are not preparing for conferences have a chance to voice their opinions on different world issues each week and learn more about MUN protocol.
Each year, Harrow Hong Kong hosts its own conference, called HARMUN. After months of preparation, HARMUN III took place on the 19th-20th of January. It was our largest, first international and inter-Harrow conference to date, featuring international schools from Hong Kong as well as delegates from Harrow Beijing and Harrow Shanghai.
Over the course of the weekend, delegates had the opportunity to debate in seven exciting councils, with United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO), United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), and the World Health Organisation (WHO) being new to HARMUN. Each council debated current world issues, ranging from sustainable oceanic development to solving the humanitarian crisis in Yemen, fighting for mental health awareness across Asia, to the protection of asylum seekers’ rights in Australia.
This year, HARMUN was able to provide for delegates who were new to MUN as well as experienced delegates. Each council engaged in high quality debate, and many went on to debate further topics out of interest in the last couple of hours of the conference, with some focussing on international relations and others focussing on taboos, such as ‘Should abortion be legalised?’.
Many peaceful resolutions and amendments were passed over the course of the conference.
