The lead organization for the International Year was UNESCO. There was a logic to this, in that UNESCO is the United Nations organization dealing with education, and also in that the constitutional mandate of UNESCO involves the encouragement of a global culture of peace. Within the UNESCO Secretariat in Paris, a specific International Year for the Culture of Peace Taskforce was established from 1998 to 2000, with the aim of co-ordinating the activities to publicize the International Year.