UNESCO places monuments of kyiv and the historic center of Lviv on the list of world heritage “in danger”

You won’t find Venice as a world heritage site “in danger”. On the other hand, the Saint Sophia Cathedral and monastic buildings in kyiv have been included, as has the historic center of Lviv, UNESCO announced on Friday September 15. The World Heritage Committee organized in Riyadh (Saudi Arabia) made this decision due to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the UN agency said. The historic center of Odessa had already been included on this list in January.

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At the beginning of July, a “historic building” had been bombed in Lviv in what was then, according to UNESCO, the “first” attack since the start of the conflict in an area protected by the World Heritage Convention, and therefore the first “breach” of this text of which Russia is a signatory, according to the UN agency. UNESCO has recorded damage to 270 Ukrainian cultural sites since the start of the Russian invasion on February 24, 2022.

Saint Sophia Cathedral, located in the historic center of kyiv, is “one of the principal monuments representing the architecture and monumental art of the early 11th century” in Ukraine, according to UNESCO. It has been listed as a World Heritage Site since 1990. The historic center of Lviv, a city founded in the Middle Ages, was listed as a World Heritage Site in 1996.