UNESCO names Moroccan city Essaouira world heritage
Morocco, Culture, 12/15/2001

The Paris-based United Nations Educational, Cultural and Scientific Organization has named the Moroccan Atlantic city of Essaouira part of the world heritage list.

Royal advisor and chairman of the Essaouira-Mogador local association, Andre Azoulay, said this is a historical decision, fruit of unrelenting and resolved efforts by those who never doubted Essaouira was able to highlight its historic assets and use them for economic, social and cultural development of the city.

New sites announced at UNESCO's annual meeting in Helsinki are, Brazil's Chapada dos Veadeiros and Emas national parks and Fernando de Noronha and Atoll das Rocas reserves, Britain's Dorset and East Devon coastlines and Cuba's Alejandro de Humboldt National Park.

Russia's Central Sikhote-Alin, Switzerland's Jungfrau-Aletsch-Bietschhorn and Israel's Masada National Park also were named World Heritage nature sites.

New cultural heritage sites, including Samarkand in Uzbekistan, the historic centers of Vienna in Austria and Goias in Brazil and the Falun mining area in Sweden also were added to the Paris-based U.N. group's list.

UNESCO's World Heritage Committee is responsible for implementing the 1972 U.N. Convention on the protection of cultural and natural sites around the world.

To its World Heritage List in Danger, it added the rice terraces of the Philippine cordilleras and the ancient holy city of Abu Mena in Egypt, bringing the total to 31 sites worldwide.

In addition, it extended three natural sites: the Galapagos islands of Ecuador, the volcanoes of Kamchatka and Kluchevskoy Nature Park in Russia, and the Lake Turkana national parks in Kenya.

Previous Stories:
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