UN has a job vacancy for a temporary legal assistant in New York.

Responsibilities of legal assistant 

•  Provide legal and general office support to the Chief, the legal officers and other staff members.
•  Research and compile legal materials for use in the preparation of legal opinions in the area of treaty law and practice.
•  Handle or refer to the appropriate officer a variety of verbal and written inquiries from internal and external parties. This may include providing information on processes and procedures related to specific legal activities, participation in treaties, requirements for the deposit of legal documentation, etc.
•  Verify and process legal instruments ensuring conformity to relevant guidelines and requirements, monitor requisite follow-up actions, approvals, etc. under supervision.
•  Under supervision, may edit and conduct a final check for accuracy of a variety of specialized legal documentation, instruments, publications and related correspondence.
• Also, service various meetings like selecting and compiling relevant background materials; assisting in the preparation of relevant documents; attending meetings and drafting minutes; monitoring follow-up actions and many more.
•  Coordinate ceremonies and related meetings, ensuring timely receipt of legal instruments and other requisite documentation.
•  In addition to these, assist in the preparation of legal documents for electronic storage, access and circulation for categorization and indexing purposes
• Also, create maintain and update internal databases
• IS also responsible to generate a variety of standard and non-standard statistical and other reports from various databases.
•  Provide initial technical support to users to resolve hardware/software problems and provide a link with the Information Management Unit in the Section
• assist in forecasting budget for information technology requirements;
• maintain an inventory of existing computer equipment.
•  Provides general office support services; drafts, edits, proofreads and finalizes for legal matters.
• should also be responsible to set up and maintaining records.
•  Schedule meetings and monitor deadlines
•  Coordinate administrative services as required.

Requirements for the position of legal assistant

• minimum qualification is a high school diploma.
• A minimum of seven years of experience in paralegal work, conference servicing, general office support or related area.
• Knowledge of organizational legal framework, relevant legal processes, procedures and terminology for review, examination, preparation and processing of legal documents.
• Ability to conduct research using diverse legal research sources.
•  In addition, has the ability to review and synthesize information and present findings and recommendations in a required format.
• Knowledge of information management, classification and retrieval systems.
• Also holds the ability to show tact and discretion in dealing with high-ranking officials and with confidential matters and materials.
• Can work collaboratively with colleagues to achieve organizational goals.
• fluency in oral and written English.

Additional desirable requirements for the job

• Experience in the handling of legal documentation, particularly treaties and international agreements.
• Also, having experience in conducting legal research is desirable. Experience in using correspondence and document management systems, such as Documentum or similar systems.
• In addition to the above experiences; providing legal support/assistance within an international organization.
• Knowledge of another official United Nations language.

Special notes from UN

This position is considered temporary until 14c September. If Staff from the UN is appointed, he\she will take the position as a temporary assignment. You should also note that the position might be limited to ‘internal candidates’ who were recruited through exams or other selection processes.

Furthermore, passing Global General Service Test(GGST) is a prerequisite for requirement consideration.