SUBJECT: KEY THEMES AT WORLD HERITAGE COMMITTEE 6-

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 04 PARIS 000238

SIPDIS

FOR IO/T; PLS PASS TO NATIONAL PARK SERVICE, ATTN: STEPHEN
MORRIS

E.O. 12958: N/A
TAGS: SCUL SENV TBIO UN
SUBJECT: SUBJECT: KEY THEMES AT WORLD HERITAGE COMMITTEE 6-
11 DECEMBER 2004 MEETING: NATIONAL PRIDE, TOURIST DOLLARS,
GOVERNANCE ISSUES



1. Summary. The World Heritage Committee ("Committee"),
the 21-nation governing body of the 1972 UNESCO World
Heritage Convention, held a 6-11 December special session in
Paris. The UNESCO World Heritage List's importance as a
symbol of national pride and as a source of tourist revenues
was evident throughout the meeting.

Discussions covered:

Nomination and evaluation procedures for potential
World Heritage Sites, a review of Regional periodic
reports concerning the state of current World Heritage
Sites;

Working methods of the Committee, including:

Member-state participation in Advisory Body
evaluation of their proposed sites;

Proposals to refine the Secretariat's workload;

Possibilities for additional Committee meetings;
and

Whether WHC members should refrain from nominating
sites during their tenure on the WHC. (The USG,
which is not likely to nominate any sites in the
near future, is considering standing for election
to one of the 12 seats on the WHC which will
become vacant in fall 2005);

Plans for a special meeting of experts to be held in
Russia to examine how the concept of Outstanding
Universal Value is being applied in various contexts
with a view towards enhancing the representative nature
of the World Heritage List; and

The interplay between the 1972 World Heritage
Convention and more recent UNESCO documents,
particularly the 2003 Intangible Heritage Convention.

End summary.

Introduction
--------------


2. The WHC held its 7th Extraordinary Session at UNESCO
Headquarters in Paris from December 6-11, 2004. The Session
was held as a follow-up meeting to the 28th Session of the
Committee that was held in China during June and July 2004.
The 29th Session of the Committee will be held in Durban,
South Africa in July, 10-17 2005.


3. The U.S. delegation included US Ambassador to UNESCO
Louise Oliver, Department of the Interior Deputy Assistant
Secretary Paul Hoffman, Director of the National Park

SIPDIS
Service Fran P. Mainella, National Park Service Acting Chief
of International Affairs Stephen Morris and USUNESCO
political officer Anne Carson.


4. The USG participated as an Observer at this December
2004 session. (Note. The USG is considering standing for
election to one of the twelve Committee seats, which will be
filled at the General Assembly of States Parties meeting
held in conjunction with the 3-21 October 2005 UNESCO
General Conference. The USG, which was the first signatory
to the World Heritage Convention, has served as an elected
member of the Committee during several periods over its
approximately thirty-year history. End note.)


5. While the interventions of many Committee reps on the
finer points of procedure seemed geared toward enhancing the
chances for their nation's individual nominations, there
seemed to general agreement to preserve the exclusivity and
prestige associated with World Heritage Sites. (Note. The
interventions, especially those of developing countries,
evidenced the importance of inscription of a site on the
World Heritage List for national pride and commercial
interests. For example, the representative from St. Lucia
referred several times to the "elation" in her country when
its nominated site was finally inscribed on the World
Heritage list. End note.)

Nomination and Evaluation Procedures; Review of Reports;
Procedural Details
-------------- --------------


6. The Committee completed its work on revising its
Operational Guidelines by adding some finishing touches and
deciding that these Guidelines will be first applied to site
nominations submitted in 2007. (Note. Current Guidelines
went into effect in 2002. End note.) The finishing touches
included:
A definition of "transboundary sites" (sites with parts
in adjoining countries, whether or not contiguous, and
nominated as transboundary sites; not to be confused
with multinational serial nominations, with multiple
thematically- related sites in different countries);

A request to the World Heritage Convention Secretariat
to update "tentative" lists submitted by States Parties
indicating possible future World Heritage nominations
within its territory to reflect any changes in the list
(e.g., if a site becomes a World Heritage Site, or if
the Member State country removes the site from its
list);

A specification that the "comparative analysis"
required in the nomination dossier must be along the
same lines as analyses of similar properties, whether
or not on the World Heritage List, both at the national
and international levels; and

An addition of language encouraging States Parties to
grant to UNESCO the non-exclusive right to use
photographs, etc., of the World Heritage Sites, with
the profits to go to the World Heritage Fund.


7. The Working Methods of the Committee (which cover
precise points such as timing of submission of various
documents and are separate from the "Operational
Guidelines") will be reviewed at the July 2005 Durban
meeting.


8. At this December 2004 meeting, the Committee:

Reaffirmed earlier decisions that total nominations may
not exceed 45 per year and that each State Party may
submit only two nominations in any one year, so long as
one is for a natural site, and including any previously
submitted nominations that were deferred.

Stressed the importance of rigorous adherence to
established timetables for the submission of various
documents, such as supplementary information to the
Advisory Bodies following their examination of the
site.

Discussed the process by which countries can correct
factual errors in the evaluation of their proposed
sites by the Advisory Bodies and the mechanics of
drafting of proposed decisions by the Secretariat;

Discussed proposals to streamline the Committee's
consideration of State of Conservation reports;

Debated whether there was a need for additional
meetings and the possibility that establishing working
groups would assist the Committee in accomplishing its
goals in a timelier manner;

Incorporated the recommendation of the USG rep that new
WHC Members and new heads of delegation be afforded the
opportunity to attend training and orientation sessions
to better acquaint them with the Convention, previous
Committee decisions on key issues, the Operational
Guidelines, and the Rules of Procedure. (Note. The
USG plans to make similar practical recommendations
concerning a variety of matters if elected to the
Committee.)



9. The Committee also reviewed several items pertaining to
Periodic Regional reports (the pending report for Europe and
North America; action plans following-up on completed
reports for the Arab States; Africa; Asia and the Pacific,
and Latin America) concerning the state of World Heritage
Sites. Based on a recommendation originating with Canada
and the USG, the Committee decided to suspend the cycle of
Periodic Reporting for one year to evaluate the results of
the first cycle and make any necessary changes.


10. In an apparent response to some State Party complaints
about extensive and sometimes duplicative reporting
requirements, the Committee asked the UNESCO Secretariat to
present proposals at the July meeting in Durban for better
coordination and use of required reports concerning the
maintenance of World Heritage Sites.


11. In other financial and administrative matters, the
Committee:
Asked the World Heritage Center director to take
appropriate steps to regularize the use UNESCO World
Heritage Emblem under intellectual property law;
Reviewed some aspects of the Partnership for World
Heritage Conservation (PACT); and

Approved the agenda for the July 11-17 Durban meeting.

(Note. The full text of the Committee's decision is
available on UNESCO's web site under 7 WHC-04/7EXT.COM/17.
End Note.

Should WHC Members Refrain from Nominating Sites While
Serving on the WHC?
-------------- --------------


12. Continuing discussions from the July 2004 Committee
meeting in China, Committee reps from Egypt and Saint Lucia
cited statistics showing that the "success rate" for
inscription of nominated sites is much higher for the 21
nations sitting on the Committee than it is for the 157
States-Parties not sitting on the Committee.


13. There was discussion of an opinion of the UNESCO Legal
Advisor, which states that the terms of the 1973 World
Heritage Convention do not allow the Committee to prohibit
any State Party from making a nomination. The opinion goes
on to state, however, that State Party candidates for the
WHC may say (i.e., in the nature of a campaign pledge) that
they will voluntarily refrain from nominating sites within
their countries during their service on the Committee.
Some Committee reps expressed the view that allowing such
"pledges" could limit a nation's ability to nominate a site
and would therefore be inconsistent with both principles of
state party sovereignty and with the specific intent of the
World Heritage Convention. Discussions on this subject will
continue at the July meeting in Durban, South Africa.

What Gives a Nominated Site "Universal" Value within the
Meaning of the Convention ?
-------------- --------------


14. Discussions at previous Committee meetings about a
"representative, balanced and credible" list of World
Heritage Sites resulted in a decision to convene a meeting
of experts to formulate recommendations to assist the
Committee develop a strategy to achieve this goal. In
particular, the expert meeting is charged with examining the
concept of Outstanding Universal Value as it has been
applied in different ways by the Advisory Bodies.


15. At this December 2004 meeting, the Committee accepted
the Russian Federation's offer of Kazan as a meeting site
for the March 2005 meeting and specified that the experts'
report would be considered at the July 2005 Durban Committee
meeting. (Note. The USG has nominated an expert to serve
on the 50-member expert group. End note.)

Relationship between 1973 World Heritage Convention and
other Normative Documents, particularly the 2003 Intangible
Heritage Convention
-------------- --------------


16. Several Committee rep interventions indicated
unwillingness to tie closely the "flagship" World Heritage
Convention, with 178 States-Parties, to the 2003 Intangible
Heritage Convention, with fewer than ten States-Parties, or
to other normative UNESCO documents, such as Man and the
Biosphere or the Convention on Biological Diversity, whose
substantive provisions are not accepted by many nations. In
particular, many Committee members and several observers
spoke against the proposed decision to modify the World
Heritage Convention's Operational Guidelines to remove a
reference to intangible cultural values, as they saw no
inherent conflict between the 2 conventions, and thought it
inappropriate to subordinate the well-established World
Heritage treaty to the as-yet untested Intangible Heritage
Convention.


17. Some Committee interventions noted that World Heritage
Sites include not only impressive edifices, but also natural
sites of beauty and locales in which man and nature have
achieved an extraordinary degree of functional and aesthetic
harmony and necessarily involved principles expounded in
other UNESCO normative documents, especially the 2003
Intangible Cultural Heritage Convention.

18. The representative from Benin appeared to encapsulate
the feeling informing many interventions when he drew an
analogy to a father trying to determine how to divide his
attentions and riches between a 32-year old eldest unmarried
son, still seeking to acquire possessions to demonstrate
strength and manhood, and his much younger sons, who still
needed care and upbringing. There was no perfect solution,
he pointed out. The sons were at different stages of their
lives and so could not be treated alike.

19. The Committee decision on this point generally noted
that there might be some overlapping coverage in UNESCO
documents and invited the Secretariat to continue to
formulate suggestions for ways to interrelate the documents.

Oliver