UNESCO has added four new Asia Pacific landmarks to its list of World Heritage sites. Following the 35th session of the World Heritage committee, held from 19-29 June 2011 at UNESCO Headquarters in Paris, eight new locations were added globally, including two sites in Japan, one in China and one in Australia.
In Japan, ‘Hiraizumi – Temples, Gardens & Archaeological Sites Representing the Buddhist Pure Land’ was proffered World Heritage status. The attraction actually comprises five sites in the north of Honshu Island, including the sacred Mount Kinkeisan. It also features government offices dating back to the 11th Centuries when Hiraizumi was the administrative centre of the northern Japan. The other Japanese entry was Ogasawara Islands; a group of 30 islands covering 7,393 hectares in the Pacific Ocean, which are home to 195 endangered bird species.
The Chinese addition to the World Heritage list was the ‘West Lake Cultural Landscape of Hangzhou’, in China’s Zhejiang province. The landscape, which includes temples, pagodas, pavilions, gardens and ornamental trees, is said to have inspired poets, scholars and artists since the 9th century.
Finally Western Australia’s Ningaloo Coast is also now a UNESCO World Heritage site. The 604,500-hectare land and sea area of the Ningaloo Coast includes one of the longest near-shore reefs in the world and an extensive network of underground caves.
These four Asia Pacific sites are joined on the UNESCO list by Coffee Cultural Landscape of Colombia, Historic Bridgetown and its Garrison in Barbados, the Kenya Lake System in the Great Rift Valley, and the Primeval Beech Forests of the Carpathians in Germany and Slovakia. More additions are expected in the coming days.
Meanwhile Thailand has withdrawn from UNESCO’s World Heritage Convention over its ongoing border dispute with Cambodia. The country’s Natural Resource & Environment Minister, Suwit Khunkitti made the announcement to Thai media in Paris on Saturday, where it was discussing the future of Cambodia’s 900 year-old UESCO-listed Preah Vihear temple complex, which Thailand claims overlaps its territory.
The decision to withdraw reportedly came after UNESCO agreed to discuss Cambodia’s proposed management plan for Preah Vihear. Recent fighting on the border close to the mountain temple has killed dozens of people on both sides, and reportedly damaged the temple buildings.
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