News

World Wetlands Day marks the date of the adoption of the Convention on Wetlands on 2 February 1971 in the Iranian city of Ramsar on the shores of the Caspian Sea. Today’s World Wetlands Day under the theme, ‘Wetlands and Biodiversity,’ is an opportunity to highlight the importance of wetland biodiversity conservation. The significance of wetland biodiversity was stressed recently by the ...

The Director of the World Heritage Centre, Ms Mechtild Rössler, and Mr Miguel Clüsener-Godt, Director of the Man and the Biosphere Programme, express their deep sadness and profound concern following the death, ascertained on 29 January 2020, of Mr Homero Gómez González, manager of a component of the Monarch Butterfly Biosphere Reserve (Mexico), property inscribed on the World Heritage List ...

UNESCO’s International Day of Commemoration in Memory of the Victims of the Holocaust will take place on 22 January and focus on the Nazi concentration and extermination camp of Auschwitz-Birkenau, whose liberation took place 75 years ago (27 January 1945). This year, the Organization will mark the anniversary at its Headquarters in Paris with a conference, a ceremony, and two exhibitions ...

It is with the deepest sorrow that we learned of the passing of Dr Roland Silva, former President of ICOMOS International (1990-1999) and its Emiritus President thereafter.  He died in Colombo, Sri Lanka, on 1 January 2020 at the age of 86 after a brief illness. On this very sad occasion, the UNESCO World Heritage Centre would like to join Dr Silva’s friends from all corners of the world in ...

The Director-General of UNESCO, Audrey Azoulay, on Monday received Ahmad Jalali, Ambassador of the Islamic Republic of Iran, and discussed tensions in the Middle East with particular regard to heritage and culture. The Director-General recalled the provisions of the 1954 Convention for the Protection of Cultural Property in the Event of Armed Conflict and the 1972 Convention Concerning the ...