The 196 members states of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) are to cast votes from Friday next week on new additions to its World Heritage and World Heritage in Danger lists when they meet in Busan, South Korea."We may not have the means to deploy peacekeepers... but we can send a message to the entire world," the director of UNESCO's World Heritage Centre, Lazare Eloundou Assomo told AFP."These sites are important, and everything must be done to prevent their destruction."
Sebastia, thought to be Biblical Samaria, in the West Bank could be listed as in danger © Jaafar ASHTIYEH / AFP
Safeguarding "heritage allows communities that have been traumatised, victims of conflicts, to begin to come back and rebuild," he added.Some 1,200 sites around the globe are listed as part of UNESCO World Heritage.Making the heritage list often sparks a lucrative tourism drive, and can unlock funding for the preservation of sites that can face threats including pollution, war and negligence.A site being qualified as heritage in danger, Assomo said, was not a reprimand but a measure meant to help states "find funding, partners and attention" to better preserve it.Fast-tracked to 'in danger'Three sites, so far unlisted, are expected to be fast-tracked and voted straight onto the list of endangered places.These could include the archaeological site of Sebastia, identified as being Biblical Samaria, in the Israeli-occupied Palestinian territory of the West Bank.The site itself is in an area of the West Bank under Israeli control.
