Category Archives: Unesco

Court ruling paves way for Istanbul’s Hagia Sophia to revert to mosque

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Status of Unesco-listed 1,500-year-old building has been hotly debated for decades

Turkey’s president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, has formally converted Istanbul’s crowning architectural jewel, the Hagia Sophia, from a museum into a mosque – a politically charged decision that has drawn international criticism but delighted his conservative base.

Turkey’s highest administrative court, the council of state, paved the way for the move after it ruled unanimously on Friday to annul a 1934 cabinet decree that stripped the 1,500-year-old building of its religious status.

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Welsh slate mining landscape nominated as world heritage site

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Government backing raises hopes of preserving ‘place that roofed the world’


An extraordinary landscape shaped by many centuries of slate production has been nominated by the UK government for Unesco world heritage status, a distinction enjoyed by sites such as the Taj Mahal, the Great Wall of China and Stonehenge.

The production of slate in Gwynedd, north-west Wales, has left a landscape dotted with underground workings, terraces cut into hillsides, grey, towering tips and bright blue pools, all nestling within mountains and woodland.

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Unesco removes ‘racist’ Belgian carnival from heritage list

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Carnival of Aalst included parade float caricaturing Orthodox Jews

Unesco has removed an annual carnival in the Belgian city of Aalst from its heritage list over persistent charges of antisemitism.

In an unprecedented move, Unesco’s intergovernmental committee for the safeguarding of intangible cultural heritage said it was withdrawing the carnival “over recurring repetition of racist and antisemitic representations” at the event.

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Traditional Thai massage gains Unesco heritage status

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Practice of nuad Thai, which has gained global recognition, is added to Unesco’s ‘intangible cultural heritage’ list

The body-folding, sharp-elbowed techniques of Thai massage have been added to Unesco’s prestigious heritage list.

Originating in India and practised in Thailand for centuries, the massage was popularised when a special school opened in the 1960s to train massage therapists from around the world.

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The ‘qualifications passport’ scheme breaking down barriers for migrants

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Having their skills recognised is one of the main obstacles to employment faced by refugees in developed countries

The armed rebels had first ransacked the hospital where Timothée* worked as a doctor. Then, they went door to door with machetes, hunting down those seen as the wealthiest – the most educated first. When the house next door was burned down with his neighbours still inside, Timothée fled.

Without a chance to grab his passport or phone, Timothée ran through the darkness of the bush of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, knowing he might never see his family or his fiancee again.

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Unesco advisers raise concerns over plan to raise Warragamba dam wall

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World Heritage centre says proposal would result in inundation of large part of world heritage-listed Blue Mountains wilderness area

Advisers to the United Nations have expressed concerns about a plan to raise the Warragamba Dam wall because of its likely impact on the Blue Mountains.

The World Heritage Centre, which advises the UN committee in charge of world heritage properties, published its position on the project on Friday.

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Italy’s new ruins: heritage sites being lost to neglect and looting

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Overgrown and weathered, many historical monuments are disappearing as public funds for culture fail to match modern Italy’s inheritance

Legend has it that the grotto hidden among the craggy cliffs on San Marco hill in Sutera in the heart of Sicily holds a treasure chest full of gold coins. In order to find it, three men must dream simultaneously about the precise place to dig.

Treasure or no treasure, the grotto itself is an archaeological gem, its walls adorned with a multi-coloured Byzantine-esque 16th-century fresco depicting Jesus, the Virgin Mary and Saints Paulinus, Luke, Mark and Matthew.

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Digital assistants like Siri and Alexa entrench gender biases, says UN

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Female-voiced tech often gives submissive responses to queries, Unesco report finds

Assigning female genders to digital assistants such as Apple’s Siri and Amazon’s Alexa is helping entrench harmful gender biases, according to a UN agency.

Research released by Unesco claims that the often submissive and flirty responses offered by the systems to many queries – including outright abusive ones – reinforce ideas of women as subservient.

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FOI regime thwarts bid to expose Great Barrier Reef lobbying, researcher says

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Legal expert tried to shed light on Australia’s efforts to prevent reef being listed as ‘in danger’ by Unesco

A legal expert has slammed Australia’s freedom of information regime after spending two years and more than $1,000 trying to shed light on Australia’s enormous lobbying effort to prevent the Great Barrier Reef from being listed as “in danger”.

In 2014-15, Australian government officials spent more than $100,000 visiting and lobbying members of Unesco’s world heritage committee to keep the Great Barrier Reef off the “in danger” list.

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