US first lady Jill Biden attends flag-raising ceremony at UNESCO in Paris; Washington officially re-enters UN agency after five-year hiatus

The US first lady Jill Biden attended a flag-raising ceremony at UNESCO in Paris yesterday. With this, Washington has officially re-entered the UN agency after a controversial five-year hiatus. Before the flag-raising, Biden made remarks about the importance of American leadership in preserving cultural heritage and empowering education and science across the globe. She said that this move was an example of President Joe Biden’s pledge about restoring their leadership on the world stage.

Earlier, The United States had announced its intention to rejoin UNESCO in June, and the organization’s 193 member states voted to approve the US reentry this month. The US exit from UNESCO in 2017 cited an alleged anti-Israel bias within the organization. The decision followed a 2011 move by UNESCO to include Palestine as a member state, which led the US and Israel to cease financing the agency. The US withdrawal became official a year later in 2018.