New World Heritage Sites in Asia Pacific for 2016

The World Heritage Committee, part of UNESCO, has inscribed new sites on the list of world heritage sites as part of its 40^th session which opened on 10 July, 2016. The list includes a transnational site, which is found in Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan.

The newly inscribed sites include:

Khangchendzonga National Park (India) – Located at the heart of the Himalayan range in northern India in the state of Sikkim, the Khangchendzonga National Park includes a unique diversity of plains, valleys, lakes, glaciers and snow-capped mountains covered with ancient forests, including the world’s third highest peak, Mount Khangchendzonga, also known as Kangchenjunga. The area is also part of the Khangchendzonga Biosphere Reserve.

Archaeological Site of Ani, Turkey – This site is located on a secluded plateau of northeast Turkey overlooking a ravine that forms a natural border with Armenia. The site presents a comprehensive overview of the evolution of medieval architecture through examples of almost all the different architectural innovations of the region between the 7th and 13th centuries CE.

This medieval city combines residential, religious and military structures, characteristic of medieval urbanism built up over the centuries by Christian and then Muslim dynasties. The city flourished in the 10th and 11th centuries CE when it became the capital of the medieval Armenian kingdom of the Bagratides and profited from control of one branch of the Silk Road. Later, under Byzantine, Seljuk, and Georgian sovereignty, it maintained its status as an important crossroads for merchant caravans. The Mongol invasion and an earthquake in 1319 marked the beginning of the city’s decline.

Watch a video on conservation at Ani, from the World Monuments Fund

Zuojiang Huashan (左江花山) Rock Art Cultural Landscape, China – Located on the steep cliffs in the border regions of southwest China, in Ningming County, Guangxi, these 38 sites of rock art at Huashan (花山壁画) illustrate the life and rituals of the Luoyue people. They date from the period around the 5th century BCE to the 2nd century CE. In a surrounding landscape of karst, rivers and plateaux, they depict ceremonies which have been interpreted as portraying the bronze drum culture once prevalent across southern China. This cultural landscape is the only remains of this culture today.

Watch a video of the Zuojiang Huashan Rock Art area from the Bradshaw Foundation

Archaeological Site of Nalanda Mahavihara (Nalanda University) at Nalanda, Bihar, India – The Nalanda Mahavihara site is in Bihar, northeastern India. It comprises the archaeological remains of a monastic and scholastic institution dating from the 3rd century BCE to the 13th century CE. It includes stupas, shrines, viharas (residential and educational buildings) and important art works in stucco, stone and metal. Nalanda stands out as the most ancient university of the Indian subcontinent. It engaged in the organised transmission of knowledge over an uninterrupted 800 years.

The Persian Qanat, Iran – Throughout the arid regions of Iran, agricultural and permanent settlements are supported by the ancient qanat (قنات‎) system of tapping alluvial aquifers at the heads of valleys and conducting the water along underground tunnels by gravity, often over many km. The 11 qanats representing this system include rest areas for workers, water reservoirs and watermills. The traditional communal management system still in place allows equitable and sustainable water sharing and distribution. The qanats provide exceptional testimony to cultural traditions and civilisations in desert areas with an arid climate.

Read about the significance of the qanat system in a chapter extract by the late Edward Goldsmith, environmentalist, author and philosopher. In it Goldsmith says: "...until recently, qanats still supplied 75% of the water used in Iran, for both irrigation and household purposes."

Nan Madol: Ceremonial Centre of Eastern Micronesia, Federated States of Micronesia – Nan Madol is a series of 99 artificial islets off the southeast coast of Pohnpei that were constructed with walls of basalt and coral boulders. These islets harbour the remains of stone palaces, temples, tombs and residential domains built between 1200 and 1500 CE. These ruins represent the ceremonial centre of the Saudeleur dynasty, a vibrant period in Pacific Island culture.

The huge scale of the edifices, their technical sophistication and the concentration of megalithic structures bear testimony to complex social and religious practices of the island societies of the period. The site was also inscribed on the List of World Heritage in Danger due to threats, notably the siltation of waterways that is contributing to the unchecked growth of mangroves and undermining existing edifices.

The List of World Heritage in Danger is designed to inform the international community of conditions which threaten the very characteristics for which properties were inscribed on the World Heritage List and rally the support of the international community for their protection.

Natural sites include:

Source: Hubei government tourism website. Shennongjia.

Hubei Shennongjia (神农架), China – Located in Hubei Province, in central-eastern China, the site consists of Shennongding (神农顶)/Badong (巴东县) to the west and Laojunshan (老君山) to the east.

Hubei Shennongjia is one of three centres of biodiversity in China. The site features prominently in the history of botanical research and was the object of international plant collecting expeditions in the 19th and 20th centuries. It protects the largest primary forests remaining in Central China and provides habitats for rare animal species such as the Chinese giant salamander, the golden or snub-nosed monkey, the clouded leopard, common leopard and the Asian black bear.

Lut Desert, Iran – The Lut Desert, or Dasht-e-Lut (دشت لوت), is located in the southeast of the country. The property represents an exceptional example of ongoing geological processes. Between June and October, this arid subtropical area is swept by strong winds, which transport sediment and cause aeolian (wind-caused) erosion on a colossal scale. The site presents some of the most spectacular examples of aeolian yardang landforms (massive corrugated ridges). It also contains stony deserts and dune fields.

Western Tien-Shan (Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and Uzbekistan) – The transnational site is located in the Tien-Shan (天山) mountain system, one of the largest mountain ranges in the world. Western Tien-Shan is situated at an altitude of 700 to 4,503m. It features diverse landscapes, which are home to to many forest types and unique plant communities.. It is of global importance as a centre of origin for a number of cultivated fruit crops.

The new mixed, cultural and natural, sites include:

The Ahwar of Southern Iraq: Refuge of Biodiversity and the Relict Landscape of the Mesopotamian Cities, Iraq – The Ahwar (الاهوار) of Southern Iraq – also known as the Iraqi Marshlands – are unique as one of the world’s largest inland delta systems, in an extremely hot and arid environment. The Ahwar is made up of seven sites: three archaeological sites and four wetland marsh areas in southern Iraq. The archaeological cities of Uruk and Ur and the Tell Eridu archaeological site form part of the remains of the Sumerian cities and settlements that developed in southern Mesopotamia between the 4th and the 3rd millennium BC in the marshy delta of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers. Some accounts say this area is the Biblical garden of Eden.

Besides Nan Madol, the World Heritage Committee has also added Uzbekistan’s Historic Centre of Shakhrisyabz to the List of World Heritage in Danger due to the over-development of tourist infrastructure in the site.

The Committee expressed concern over the destruction of buildings in the centre of the site’s medieval neighbourhoods and the construction of modern facilities including hotels and other buildings which have created irreversible changes to the appearance of historic Shakhrisyabz. The Committee has requested that UNESCO’s World Heritage Centre and the International Council on Monuments and Sites (ICOMOS) send a joint mission to assess the extent of damage and propose appropriate corrective measures.

The Historic Centre of Shakhrisyabz, located on the Silk Road in southern Uzbekistan, is over 2,000 years old and was the cultural and political centre of the Kesh region in the 14th and 15th century. The Historic Centre of Shakhrisabz bears witness to the city’s secular development and to centuries of its history. Its peak was  particularly to the period of its apogee, under the rule of Amir Temur and the Temurids, from the 15th to 16th century.

Interested?

Watch the Committee’s video recordings (B-roll)

Hashtags: #UNESCO, #WorldHeritage ; #40WHC

World Heritage Committee inscribes new world heritage sites

The Singapore Botanic Gardens entrance from Botanic Gardens MRT station.

The World Heritage Committee has inscribed the Singapore Botanic Gardens (SBG) as a UNESCO World Heritage Site at the 39th session of the World Heritage Committee (WHC) in Bonn, Germany. The committee noted that the site "demonstrates the evolution of a British tropical colonial botanic garden that has become a modern world-class scientific institution used for both conservation and education", and that it has been an important centre for science, research and plant conservation, notably in connection with the cultivation of rubber plantations, in Southeast Asia since 1875.

According to the SBG, the gardens is the first and only tropical botanic garden on the UNESCO’s World Heritage List. It is the first in Asia and the third botanic gardens inscribed in the world following Orto botanico di Padova in Italy and the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, in the UK.

The inscription bid process started in 2010 following a feasibility study commissioned by the then-Ministry of Information, Communications and the Arts, in consultation with experts, academics and other stakeholders. Singapore formally submitted the official Nomination Dossier for the bid in January 2014.

The World Heritage Committee also approved the inscription of the Diyarbakir Fortress and Hevsel Gardens Cultural Landscape in Turkey; China's Tusi Sites; Susa and the Cultural Landscape of Maymand, both in Iran; the Baekje Historic Areas in Korea; the Great Burkhan Khaldun Mountain and its surrounding sacred  landscape, in Mongolia; Bethany Beyond the Jordan; and the rock art in Hail in KSA.

Source: UNESCO World Heritage Committee nomination file. Diyarbakır Fortress and Hevsel Gardens Cultural Landscape, Hevsel Gardens and Kırklar Hill, copyright: © Diyarbakır Metropolitan Municipality - Site Management Unit, author: Zeynep Sıla Akıncı.

Turkey
The Diyarbakir Fortress and Hevsel Gardens Cultural Landscape are on an escarpment of the Upper Tigres River Basin. The fortified Turkish city of Diyarbakir and the landscape around has been an important centre since the Hellenistic period, through the Roman, Sassanid, Byzantine, Islamic and Ottoman times to the present. The site encompasses the Amida Mound, known as İçkale (inner castle), the 5.8km-long city walls of Diyarbakir with their numerous towers, gates, buttresses, and 63 inscriptions from different periods, as well as Hevsel Gardens, a green link between the city and the Tigris that supplied the city with food and water.

Source: The Zunyi Huichuan District Party Committee Publicity Department. Snow-Covered Feifeng Pass. 

China
Located in the mountainous areas of southwest China, Tusi (土司) sites encompass remains of several tribal domains whose chiefs were appointed by the central government as ‘Tusi’, hereditary rulers from the 13th to the early 20th century. The Tusi system made the autonomous rule by minorities a reality, and facilitated the development of ethnic diversity, strengthened national unity, ensured borderland security, and promoted the peaceful coexistence of the central government and local minority regimes.

The sites of Laosicheng (老司城) in Yongshun County, Hunan; Tangya (唐崖) in Xianfeng County, Hubei; and Hailongtun Fortress (海龙屯城堡) in Zunyi, Guizhou that make up the site bear testimony to this form of governance, which derived from the civilisation of the Yuan and Ming periods.

Hailongtun fortress was built in 1257 CE. The Tusi arrangement was a collaboration between the central government of the Song dynasty and the Yang family, which built and owned the fortress. The family governed the area for more than 700 years, spanning Tang, Song, Yuan and Ming dynasties, from Yang Rui from the Liao ethnic group in 876 during the Tang dynasty, to Yang Yinglong, the last Tusi of Bozhou (present day Zunyi) and the 29th governor of the Yang family, died in 1600.

Being listed on the World Heritage List will promote studies on the Tusi culture and the history of Bozhou, according to the Office of the Application to World Heritage for Hailongtun, Huichuan District, Zunyi in China. The organisation noted that with Guizhou province's first cultural heritage site, it plans to strengthen the preservation and excavation of historical relics within the territory, and apply for more world cultural heritage listings.

Iran
Susa in southwest Iran, in the lower Zagros Mountains, consists of a group of archaeological mounds on the eastern side of the Shavur River, as well as Ardeshir’s palace, on the opposite bank of the river. Susa contains several layers of superimposed urban settlements in a continuous succession from the late 5^th millennium BCE until the 13^th century CE*. The site bears exceptional testimony to the Elamite, Persian and Parthian cultural traditions, which have largely disappeared.

Maymand is a self-contained, semi-arid area at the end of a valley at the southern extremity of Iran’s central mountains. The villagers are semi-nomadic agro-pastoralists. They raise their animals on mountain pastures, living in temporary settlements in spring and autumn. During the winter months they live lower down the valley in cave dwellings carved out of the soft rock (kamar), an unusual form of housing in a dry, desert environment.  This cultural landscape is an example of a system that appears to have been more widespread in the past and involves the movement of people rather than animals.

Korea
The Baekje (백제) Historic Areas, in the mountainous midwestern region of the Republic of Korea, comprise eight archaeological sites dating from 475 to 660 AD, including the Gongsanseong fortress and royal tombs at Songsan-ri related to the capital, Ungjin (present day Gongju), the Busosanseong Fortress and Gwanbuk-ri administrative buildings, and the Naseong city wall related to the capital, Sabi (now Buyeo), the royal palace at Wanggung-ri and the Mireuksa Temple in Iksan related to the secondary Sabi capital.

Together, these sites represent the later period of the Baekje Kingdom – one of the three earliest kingdoms on the Korean peninsula (18 BCE to 660 CE) –during which time they were at the crossroads of considerable technological, religious (Buddhist), cultural and artistic exchanges between the ancient East Asian kingdoms in Korea, China and Japan.

Mongolia
The Great Burkhan Khaldun (Бурхан Халдун) Mountain and its surrounding sacred landscape is in northeast Mongolia in the central part of the Khentii mountain chain. Burkhan Khaldun is associated with mountain worship. The site is also believed to be the place of Genghis Khan’s birth and burial.

Jordan
The baptism site “Bethany Beyond the Jordan” (Al-Maghtas, المغطس) is on the east bank of the River Jordan, and consists of two distinct areas: Tell Al-Kharrar (تَل الخرّار), also known as Jabal Mar-Elias (Elijah’s Hill, جبل مار إلياس) and the area of the churches of Saint John the Baptist near the river. The site is believed to be the location where Jesus of Nazareth was baptised by John the Baptist. It features Roman and Byzantine remains.

KSA
Rock art in the Hail (حائل) region of Saudi Arabia includes both Jabel Umm Sinman at Jubbah (جبة) and the Jabal al-Manjor and Raat at Shuwaymis (ال شوويمس). The ancestors of today’s Arab populations have left traces of their passages in petroglyphs and inscriptions on the rock face, covering 10,000 years of history.

Vietnam
The Committee has additionally extended Phong Nha-Ke Bang National Park (Kẻ Bàng) in Vietnam, a natural site inscribed on the World Heritage List in 2003. The extension ensures a more coherent ecosystem while providing additional protection to the catchment areas that are of vital importance for the integrity of limestone landscapes.

The site originally covered 85,754 hectares and now covers a total surface area of 126,236 hectares (a 46% increase). The Park’s landscape is formed by limestone plateaux and tropical forests. It features great geological diversity and offers spectacular phenomena, including a large number of caves and underground rivers.

Other developments during the World Heritage Committee discussions include inscribing a number of World Heritage sites  on the List of World Heritage in Danger due to damage inflicted to the property by armed groups. These include Hatra in Iraq and the Yemeni cities of Sana’a and Shibam.

Iraq
Hatra was a fortified city which grew under the influence of the Parthian Empire and was the capital of the first Arab kingdom. It withstood Roman invasions in 116 and 198 AD thanks to its walls, which are reinforced by towers.

World Heritage Committee members have declared their willingness to help Iraq as soon as the situation on the ground will allow them to do so. The Committee stressed that the danger listing of Hatra was a way to rally the support of the international community for the country’s heritage.

Two other Iraqi sites are also on the World Heritage List in Danger: Ashur (inscribed on the World Heritage List in 2003) and Samara Archaeological City (inscribed on the World Heritage List in 2007).

Yemen
The World Heritage Committee has voiced concerns about the damage to the old city of Sana’a (سناء) due to armed conflict in Yemen. Situated in a mountain valley at an altitude of 2,200 m, Sana’a has been inhabited for more than 2,500 years. Its religious and political heritage can be seen in 103 mosques, 14 hammams and over 6,000 houses, all built before the 11^th century. The neighbourhood of al Qasimi and the 12^th century al-Mahdi Mosque have been affected.


The Committee also noted that the Old Walled City of Shibam (شِبَام) in Yemen is under potential threat from the armed conflict, which compounds safeguarding and management problems already observed at the site. The Committee decided that adding it to the List of World Heritage in Danger could help reinforce international mobilisation for the safeguarding of the site.


Surrounded by a fortified wall, the 16th-century city of Shibam is one of the oldest and best examples of urban planning based on the principle of vertical construction. 

The 39^th session of the World Heritage Committee started on 28 June and will continue till 8 July under the chair of Maria Böhmer, Minister of State at the German Federal Foreign Office and member of the Bundestag. The inscription of sites will continue through 5 July.

*BCE stands for 'before common era', corresponding to BC, and CE for common era, corresponding to AD.