Unesco’s World Heritage Committee Considers 34 New Sites For Its Growing List

Next week, members of the prestigious World Heritage Committee will gather in Cambodia to consider 34 new sites for inclusion on Unesco’s World Heritage List. The occasion marks the 35th year the Committee will meet to add man-made and natural wonders considered to be of “outstanding universal value,” a quality that is said to transcends borders, politics and economics.

Mount Etna

The idea to create an international movement to protect the world's cultural and natural wonders emerged after World War I and was further inspired by the rescue of the 13th-century B.C. Egyptian temples of Abu Simbel in 1954. After Cairo announced plans to build a dam that would flood them, Unesco launched a campaign to relocate the temples, brick by brick.

his year, the Committee will meet in Phnom Penh and Siem Reap (Angkor Wat) between June 16 and June 27 to examine recommendations from the International Council of Monuments and Sites, or Icomos, and the International Union for Conservation of Nature, or IUCN, to select new additions to the World Heritage List. Up for consideration are nine natural properties, 21 cultural sites and four mixed (nature and culture).

Xinjiang Tianshan National Park

Highlights include Mount Etna in Italy, India’s Great Himalayan National Park and the historic city of Alanya, Turkey. Five of the sites up for consideration -- Hill Forts of Rajasthan in India, Al Zubarah Archaeological Site of Qatar, Historic Monuments and Sites in Kaesong of DPRK, Bolgar Historical and Archaeological Complex of Russia and Tajik National Park of Tajikistan -- will be given a second chance after having failed for a variety of reasons the first time around.