Private water raiding threatens Angkor's temples built on sand

Unchecked pumping of scarce water resource from under Siem Reap puts stability of Cambodia's ancient monuments at risk.

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A danger list in danger

WHEN an archipelago famed for its flora and fauna is deemed to have escaped from environmental peril, that might sound like good news for anyone with an interest in the fate of life on Earth. But UNESCO’s recent clean bill of health for the Galapagos islands was greeted with dismay by many of the people who care passionately about the place.

The decision to remove the islands from the list of “world heritage sites in danger”—taken at a meeting in Brasília that concluded on August 3rd—was only one of several signs that the UN agency is bending its own rules under pressure from member states. And since UNESCO is supposed to be an unprejudiced protector of the whole world’s built and natural environment, such slipping standards are not merely of concern in remote Pacific islands.

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Galapagos No Longer on List of World Heritage in Danger

The Galapagos Islands have been removed from the List of World Heritage in Danger, despite IUCN´s strong recommendation to the contrary, the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) said today.
The Galapagos Islands, which have been called a unique "living museum and showcase of evolution" were inscribed on the Danger List in 2007 because of threats posed by invasive species, unbridled tourism and overfishing.

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World Heritage Committee inscribes a total of 21 new sites on UNESCO World Heritage List (including one from the United States)

The 34th session of the World Heritage Committee meeting in Brasilia since 25 July today finished its consideration of nominations for the World Heritage List and the List of World Heritage in Danger.

One of the new areas that became a World Heritage Site is Papahanaumokuakea, a vast and isolated linear cluster of small, low lying islands and atolls, with their surrounding ocean, roughly 250 km to the northwest of the main Hawaiian Archipelago and extending over some 1931 km.

Meeting under the Chairmanship of the Minister of Culture of Brazil, João Luiz da Silva Ferreira, the Committee inscribed 21 new sites, including 15 cultural, 5 natural and 1 mixed properties. Three countries, Kiribati, Marshall Islands and Tajikistan, had sites added for the first time. One existing natural site was also recognized for its cultural values and thus becomes a mixed site.
The World Heritage Committee also added four sites to the List of World Heritage in Danger and removed the Galapagos Islands (Ecuador) from this List.

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A Tale of Two Cities

A look at two Asian cities offers a glimpse at the challenges faced once a location makes the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization's list. One, the former royal city of Luang Prabang in Laos, was listed in 1995; the other, Malaysia's trading port George Town, won its spot in 2008. While the factors shaping the two cities' futures differ, they share a common experience: Even as a listing helps preserve architectural heritage—and draws tourism—it can change the character of the local communities that are an integral part of the site's cultural value.

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The Perils of Popularity

World Heritage status places sites in the global spotlight, but does little to protect them from the tourists that follow.

In the 38 years since UNESCO launched its World Heritage program to help preserve cultural and natural treasures, nearly 900 sites—including Pompeii, Machu Picchu, and Angkor Wat—have earned the distinction. But some conservation experts now say that the uncontrolled tourism development that follows World Heritage designation may do more harm than good for the very sites the program was meant to protect.

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Spain to reopen access to prehistoric cave paintings

MADRID — Spain's Altamira cave, which contains some of the world's most important prehistoric paintings, will reopen to the public at the end of the year for the first time since 2002, the government said Tuesday.

A panel of experts will determine how many people can enter the cave located some 30 kilometres (19 miles) west of the northern city of Santander without damaging the paintings, Culture Minister Angeles Gonzalez-Sinde told reporters.

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Uganda's highest ice cap splits on Mount Margherita

The ice cap on Uganda's highest peak has split because of global warming, Uganda's Wildlife Authority (UWA) says.

The glacier is located at an altitude of 5,109m (16,763ft) in the Rwenzori mountain range, near the border with the Democratic Republic of Congo.

The authorities say a crevasse has blocked access to the Margherita summit - the third-highest peak in Africa, and a popular destination with climbers.

Scientists say glaciers in the Rwenzori range could disappear within 20 years.

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"World Heritage Cultural Landscapes. A Handbook for Conservation and Management"

ENGLISH VERSION

16 April 2010

To: Permanent Delegations and National Commissions of the States Parties to the World Heritage Convention

Subject : World Heritage paper n°26: "World Heritage Cultural Landscapes. A Handbook for Conservation and Management".

Madam/Sir,
I am pleased to inform you that World Heritage paper n°26: "World Heritage Cultural Landscapes. A handbook for Conservation and Management" is now available.
World Heritage Cultural Landscapes, a category adopted by the World Heritage Committee in 1992, has been, in a way, the precursor of the considerations of the Global Strategy for a balanced and representative World Heritage List of 1994, and of the major considerations by expert groups and the World Heritage Committee in bringing nature and culture closer together in the implementation of the World Heritage Convention.

This concept demonstrated a major change in the interpretation of this global conservation instrument that is the World Heritage Convention:
- an opening towards cultures in regions other than Europe (and specifically Pacific, Caribbean and sub-Saharan Africa);
- a recognition of the non-monumental character of the heritage of cultural landscapes;
- the acknowledgement of the links between cultural and biological diversity, specifically with sustainable land-use.
"World Heritage Cultural Landscapes. A Handbook for Conservation and Management" fulfils a need identified by the World Heritage Committee and many site managers, as it specifically examines the particular issues involved in managing cultural landscapes of outstanding universal value.

This book is directed especially towards two groups of experts and officials: those preparing nominations and those managing cultural landscapes already inscribed on the World Heritage List. More generally, this publication will help to promote good practice in the management of all cultural landscapes, using World Heritage listed and potential cultural landscapes as examples.
The English version of the book is hereby transmitted to all Permanent Delegations and National Commissions of the States Parties to the World Heritage Convention who are subscribed to English-reading distribution lists in the centralized UNESCO mailing system.

The French version of the book is currently under preparation. The completion of translation and printing is tentatively foreseen for the end of October 2010 (due to the heavy workload related to the production of the documents for the World Heritage Committee). In the meantime, States Parties subscribed to French-reading distribution lists may access the English version on-line, for information: click here.

Irish sites seek world heritage status

The Historic City of Dublin, Royal Tara, Georgian Dublin, the Céide Fields in northwest Mayo, Dún Aonghusa in Aran, the monastic site of Clonmacnoise and the Burren in Co Clare are included on a “tentative list” of nominees to Unesco for designation as world heritage sites.

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Australian Salvage Crews Successfully Refloat Stricken Coal Carrier at Great Barrier Reef

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Putin about-face on paper mill threatens freshwater treasure

BAIKALSK, Russia — The future of 20 percent of the world's supply of pure fresh water is in jeopardy because a surprise decree by Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin will allow a heavily polluting pulp mill to reopen on the southern shore of Lake Baikal in southern Siberia. Read more: http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2010/04/07/91779/putin-about-face-on-paper-mill.html#ixzz0ktzouObL

Suspicion Of Arson At Royal Tombs Fuels Deadly Clashes In Uganda

KIGALI, Rwanda - Riots erupted at venerated burial grounds in Uganda on Wednesday, and witnesses said that police officers shot and killed three protesters. The violence was a sign of continuing troubles between the Ugandan government and members of the Buganda traditional kingdom who want more local power.

The trouble started on Tuesday night in Uganda's capital, Kampala, when a suspicious fire engulfed the Kasubi tombs, built in 1882 and later converted into a royal burial ground for the Buganda kingdom. The tombs are a World Heritage site, and according to Unesco, the United Nations agency that bestows the recognition, they are "a masterpiece of human creativity" and "the most active religious place in the kingdom."

By Wednesday evening, hundreds of members of the Buganda community were still streaming toward the remains of the tombs, and kingdom officials called for a week of mourning.
"People are camped there, they lit fires, they keep on singing the kingdom's anthem," said Peter Myiga, a spokesman for the kingdom. "But there is tension that you can notice."

Those tensions exploded earlier on Wednesday when Uganda's president, Yoweri Museveni, visited the scene of the fire and protesters tried to prevent him from approaching the tombs. The main tomb, made of wood, thatch, reed and wattle, had burned to the ground, and supporters of the Buganda king, whose title is the kabaka, blamed arson. Some supporters accused the government of setting the fire.

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The New World Heritage Site You Can't Enter

The treasure-packed interior of Brussels' Stoclet Palace is a mystery to all but a privileged handful.

(By Paul Ames)

BRUSSELS, Belgium — The marble-clad palace, crowned with a quartet of muscular copper nudes, is a familiar landmark for thousands of Brussels' commuters who drive past every evening on their way to the leafy eastern suburbs.

But the treasure-packed interior of the Stoclet Palace is a mystery to all but a privileged handful and the unique artworks it contains are more remote to inhabitants of the Belgian capital than the Taj Mahal or Pyramids of Giza.

Last year, the Stoclet Palace joined the United Nations’ list of the world's greatest heritage sites.
It was one of just four European monuments added to the list, a reflection of the palace’s importance to the history of modern art, architecture and design.
The masterpiece, generally considered one of the finest private houses built in the 20th century, remains in private hands. Although the state is financing repairs and maintenance, the palace remains strictly off limits to the public.

"Very few people have ever visited it and there are hardly any photographs. That’s crazy when you think the Belgian taxpayer is paying for its repairs," said local councilor Gauthier van Outryve d’Ydewalle.

Brussels banker Adolphe Stoclet ordered the palace built in 1901 on the designs of the Austrian architect Josef Hoffmann, founder of the Wiener Werkstatte movement, which was revolutionizing art and design in Vienna.

The palace is the movement’s masterwork. Hoffmann broke with the ornate art nouveau style then fashionable in the Belgian capital, creating a grand home with clean, rectangular lines that would deeply influence the modernist and art deco movements in the decades that followed.
The Viennese movement aimed to move beyond mere architecture to create complete works of art in which the furniture, lighting, garden, floor tiles, carpets and all other elements of decoration were designed down by to the last detail to produce a unified whole.

To cap it all, Hoffman invited the great Viennese painter Gustav Klimt to create a monumental frieze — "The Tree of Life" — a mosaic encrusted with gold and precious stones that covers the dining room walls. There are also sculptures and paintings by other leading artists of the time.
"The interest of the house is acknowledged all over the world," said the citation from the U.N.’s cultural agency UNESCO including the building on the world heritage list.

"It is a remarkable illustration of the birth of constructive and decorative modernity, and is frequently presented as an example in schools of architecture all over the world."
After its completion in 1911, the palace played host to glamorous parties for the cultural glitterati of the time. Guests included Igor Stravinsky, Jean Cocteau and Claude Debussy.
In recent times, however, the palace has fallen on hard times. It has lain empty for years, apart from the live-in caretakers, while the descendents of Aldolphe Stoclet squabble over the property’s future. Estimates have put the value of the house at at least 100 million euros ($137 million), but they may be conservative, given the fact that a single painting by Klimt sold for $137.5 million in 2006.

Ownership of the house and contents is shared among seven Stoclet heirs. The Belgian government recently won a legal battle to prevent some of the heirs from selling off pieces of furniture, but while the house and its contents are now protected, there is no clear idea as to what will happen to the property.

Some of the owners have indicated they would agree to a limited opening to the public, others are firmly opposed, claiming hordes of visitors would ruin the building.
"It’s up to the owners to decide what to do with the property and they have the right to keep it completely private if they wish. There is no obligation linked to the UNESCO decision to open it to the public," said Pascale Ingelaere, a senior adviser on heritage issues to the president of Brussels’ regional government.

The regional government is hoping, however, to open exploratory talks with the family on the building's future in the next few months, she said.
"We would like to discuss this with the owners, to see to what extent we could envisage in the short- or medium-term an eventual opening to the public," Ingelaere said.
In the meantime, the regional government is paying almost half the costs of a 1.3 million euro ($1.8 million) program to carry out the most urgent preservation work up to 2014.

For the immediate future, though, there is little chance the authorities would be able to find the millions of euros needed to buy the property, even if the family could be persuaded to sell the property.

"Just now, we have some rather serious budget problems, so it’s not really the right moment," Ingelaere acknowledged. "However, if ever we had a really serious threat to the building, we’d get around the table and find a solution. We won’t let the Stoclet Palace fall down."
That at least is a sign of progress in a city that has a bad reputation for protecting its architectural heritage.

While four turn-of-the-century homes built by the city’s own art nouveau genius Victor Horta have been included on the UNESCO World Heritage list since 2000, his masterpiece — the House of the People — was demolished in 1965 and replaced by a non-descript office block.

India's Majuli Island

"Following the World Heritage Committee's decision to defer the inscription of India's Majuli Island on the World Heritage List in 2008, the State Government of Assam is working on a substantially revised nomination dossier..."

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