LAUNCH OF VIRTUAL “GLOBAL
HERITAGE PAVILION” FOR JAPAN INTERNET FAIR 2001
Paris, December 20 (No.2000-140)
- UNESCO will launch the “Global Heritage Pavilion”, a website entirely
devoted to the world's cultural and natural heritage on December 31, 2000 to
represent the Organization in Internet Fair 2001 (INPAKU), a web-based event
organised by the Government of Japan to promote the Internet.
UNESCO’s Global Heritage
Pavilion (http://www.inpaku.unesco.org)
demonstrates what the “very latest technologies can do to help make the
abundant diversity of the world's great cultures better known to all the world’s
peoples”, UNESCO Director-General Koïchiro Matsuura says in his on-line
welcome address on the website.
The entirely bilingual
English/Japanese website features an on-line version of the Tale of Genji,
the masterpiece of Japanese literature written in the 11th century by Murasaki
Shikibu. The website also offers the first virtual visit to the Island of Gorée
(Senegal), the historic site on the West coast of Africa from which hundreds of
thousands of captured men, women and children were sent to slavery.
The website’s “Global
Heritage Map” provides information on UNESCO heritage projects and campaigns,
in the areas of both tangible and intangible heritage. It also maps all the
monuments and sites registered on the World Heritage List, all documents and
document collections included in the Memory of the World Register and all
natural sites included in the List of Biosphere Reserves.
Moreover, the website links to
heritage preservation Internet sites world-wide, a virtual library, and an
interactive area including games, e-cards, etc.
Current events and news
articles on subjects related to heritage conservation will be featured in the News
and In-focus sections of the site. In addition, the Pavilion will also
maintain an up-to-date calendar of events, conferences, seminars and workshops.
As Mr Matsuura says, “UNESCO’s
Pavilion is not only an information stand or an exhibition room. It is also a
space for dialogue.”
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Contact: Information Society
Division, UNESCO tel. (+33) (0)1 45 68 44 67 a.plathe@unesco.org
