Michelle Li said she wanted to inspire world peace by nuclear disarmament with her entry in the UN Poster for Peace contest.

"My drawing illustrates that the world can work together to build long lasting peace with our very own hands," the teenager said.

Michelle, 15, won the second prize for her poster Peace in Our Hands that shows a pair of crossing hands in the foreground that cast a dove-shaped shadow in the background. Beneath the hands is a shattered missile.

A student at Dougherty Valley High School in San Ramon, California, Michelle said she used three symbols of a dove with olive branch, a nuclear missile and hands representing peace, nuclear weapons and taking actions.

The hands were not depicted with any individual racial color but with continents, representing the world taking actions against nuclear weapons.

"Through world efforts and our efforts, we can create this lasting world peace," she said. "A necessary step for that is nuclear disarmament, basically through getting rid of nuclear weapons."

Seventy years ago, the United Nations General Assembly established the goal of eliminating nuclear weapons and all weapons of mass destruction in a resolution on Jan 24, 1946.

In commemoration of the 70th anniversary of the resolution, the UN Office for Disarmament Affairs organized the Poster for Peace contest to raise awareness of the need for nuclear disarmament and to inspire citizens to use their artistic talents to promote a world free of nuclear weapons.

From Oct 24, 2015, to Jan 24, 2016, the contest attracted 4,149 entries from 123 countries. The contest's website received 200,000 page views from more than 180 countries, according to an earlier press release posted on the UN website.

Winning artwork will support the UN message on disarmament and will be presented in various platforms such as exhibits, banners, postcards and calendars, according to the UN.

Next month, 11 of the contest's award winners will be invited to the UN headquarters, where they will meet Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, General Assembly President Mogens Lykketoft and United Nations Messenger of Peace Michael Douglas. Michelle will join via video.

The first place and third prizes go to Ivan Ciro Palomino Huamani from Lima, Peru, and Anjali Chandrashekar from New York with an award of $3,000 and $1,000, respectively.

As to the award, Michelle said she would use it for college savings.

"I'm interested in going into life science because for our generation environment is really a problem that we should address," she said. "On the other hand, I'm also interested in studying art."

liazhu@chinadailyusa.com