The China-Italy World Cultural Heritage Sites Cooperation Forum was held in Hangzhou on Oct 24.
Hangzhou, China
Verona, Italy
By Zhu Jingning
A new meeting between the World Heritage sites of Italy and China took place in Hangzhou on Oct 24 within the framework of the cultural memorandum signed by the two countries in 2019.
As the countries boasting the largest number of the World Cultural Heritage sites, China and Italy are outstanding representatives of the Eastern and Western civilizations.
Culture has the power to bridge geographical gaps. This is the case with Italy's Verona and China's Hangzhou, the twin cities that are 8,800 kilometers apart yet matched by UNESCO. Both cities have been awarded the prestigious United Nations recognition for education, science and culture. In 2019, the Hangzhou West Lake Cultural Landscape and City of Verona established a friendship relationship.
The recent meeting witnessed the conversation and exchange of managing world cultural heritages.
Mariassunta Peci, Director of Service Ⅲ International Relations and Service Ⅱ UNESCO, Ministry of Culture of Italy, said that Italy has been constantly improving the protection system of cultural heritages through the implementation of laws and regulations. These legal provisions create a detailed and complex framework to ensure that national cultural heritages can be continuously protected and promoted.
Guan Qiang, Deputy Administrator of the National Cultural Heritage Administration of China, said in his keynote speech that he expected more Chinese and Italian world cultural heritage sites to be included in the Memorandum of Understanding (MOU). He emphasized that all the paired parties should implement the targets referring to the MOU and the twinning agreement in a problem-oriented approach and should jointly study and formulate medium- and long-term cooperation plans and annual plans in a complementary way.