Paris, 18 April 2000 {No.2000-33} - The first UNESCO Chairs in Cultural Heritage in North America and the Asia Pacific Region will be created at the University of Laval (Quebec, Canada) and Deakin University (Melbourne, Australia) respectively following the signing of agreements concerning their establishment by UNESCO Director-General Koïchiro Matsuura in Paris this morning.

Both chairs are established within the framework of the Forum UNESCO-University and Heritage which groups close to 200 universities in sixty-five countries. The Forum was created by UNESCO and the University of Valencia (Spain) in 1996 and has already given rise to twenty-five projects such as the restoration of wooden houses is Istanbul (Turkey) led by the University of Lund (Sweden) in co-operation with the universities of Yildiz and Zeyrek.

The UNESCO Cultural Heritage Chair in North America is based on a multidisciplinary approach involving several departments of the University of Laval which will contribute to its programme and work. The UNESCO Chair at Deakin University is devoted to town planning and heritage preservation. It is to allocate substantial funding for training and know-how sharing programmes in heritage preservation with universities in Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam.

During the signing ceremony, Mr Matsuura declared: "In creating UNESCO Cultural Heritage Chairs within your institutions - and by endowing them with the technical, human and financial resources necessary for the implementation of operational and promotional projects - you are creating between your various establishments and between all relevant disciplines, a true synergy at the service of heritage."

Recalling the close co-operation of the Forum UNESCO-University and Heritage with the International Council of Museums (ICOM), the International Council on Monuments and Sites (ICOMOS), the International Centre for the Study of the Preservation and Restoration of Cultural Property (ICCROM), the Director-General stressed the potential of universities for the safeguarding of cultural heritage. Mr Matsuura also announced that work is underway to prepare a Forum UNESCO-University and Heritage charter which will "express the ethical commitment of the universities".

The next international Forum UNESCO-University and Heritage seminar will take place in Byblos (Lebanon) from October 9 to 12.