The Star, Malaysia : Five nominees for world heritage site

Wednesday October 22, 2003

Five nominees for world heritage site

BY JACK WONG

KUCHING: Malaysia has submitted a list to nominate five of its natural and cultural sites as world heritage, said the country’s World Heritage committee chairman Datuk Dr Adi Taha.

The final stage of preparing the dossier for the nomination was now under way, he said at the opening of an Asean regional workshop on Trans-border World Heritage Site on Borneoat the Holiday Inn Hotel here yesterday.

State Assistant Minister for Planning and Resource Management Datuk Alfred Yap Chin Loi opened the workshop.

Dr Adi, who is also director-general of the Department of Museum and Antiquities, said discussion was being held to nominate the Bujang Valley of Kedah and southern Thailand Yarang sites as a trans-border cultural world heritage site.

In Sarawak, he said, the Niah and Lambir national parks and the Sibuti Islands would be a cluster in the natural heritage nomination category and the Niah Cave might be included as a cultural component of the nomination.

He said the living historical towns of Malacca and Penang, as a joint cultural site nomination, had entered the final stage of preparing the dossier.

Also in the final stage is the national park covering Pahang, Kelantan and Terengganu which would come under the natural heritage nomination.

“Another trans-border nomination would be the Pulung Tao National Park in Sarawak and Kayan-Mentarang National Park in north-east Kalimantan,” he added.

Dr Adi said the Mulu National Park in northern Sarawak and Kinabalu Park in Sabah had been listed as world heritage sites three years ago.

Yap in his speech said the United Nations Education, Scientific and Culture Organisation (Unesco) had supported the nomination of the Lanjak Entimau Wildlife Sanctuary and Batang Ai National Park in Sarawak and Betung Kerihun National Park in West Kalimantan as the first trans-border world heritage site in Asean.

The site begun in 1994 covered some one million hectares of land and formed a crucial link in the long-term conservation of Bornean biodiversity.

According to Unesco World Heritage Centre chief of the natural heritage section Natarajan Ishwaran, official submission for the proposed trans-border world heritage site was expected to be made by next February.

The listing of the sites is likely to be made in 2005, he said.