Paris - UNESCO Director-General Federico Mayor recently completed an official visit to Brazil where he met with President Fernando Cardoso and signed agreements to promote human rights, cultural activities and to protect the environment in this Latin American country.

Mr Mayor announced the reconstitution of the Slave Route, a UNESCO project that will retrace the route of the slave ships between Africa and the Americas. This research project will begin in Brazil where 60 percent of the population is descended from African slaves.

"Reconstituting the Slave Route is a way of recognising the contribution of black culture to humanity," the Director-General said on 6 September at the end of a three-day visit to Brazil.

The Slave Route project is one in a series of UNESCO projects that include the Iron Road in Africa that helped to shape this continent's cultures, the Roads of Faith that led three of the world's major religions to Jerusalem and the Silk Roads, the main arteries of communication between East and West. These projects promoted inter-cultural dialogue and recognition of diversity, Mr Mayor said. "I would like to emphasise the contribution of the black race to tolerance, understanding of others and dialogue," he said.

Mr Mayor praised the Ministry of Education and Culture's new curriculum directives, such as School TV. He announced that the Brazilian government had agreed to provide UNESCO with all of its teaching materials in the Portuguese language. These education tools are to be used in Angola and Mozambique as a contribution to strengthening peace in these African countries shattered by two decades of war.

Mr. Mayor met with First Lady Ruth Cardoso, who is also President of Community Solidarity. He agreed that UNESCO would back this agency in its programmes to fight poverty and social exclusion for the government, particularly in the field of adult illiteracy.

During a visit to the chancellery, the Director-General signed a co-operation agreement to preserve Brazilian ecotone, a transition zone between ecosystems. This agreement will be implemented in the State of Tocantins in central Brazil and will permit the "appropriate management in the preservation as well as the institutional development" in this transition zone. Brazil's main ecosystems such as tropical forests, mountains, marshlands and caatinga, a forest of thorny shrubs and stunted trees, are especially vulnerable in this region.

Mr Mayor also signed a co-operation agreement with the Justice Minister of Brazil, Nelson Jobim, and with the Latin American Faculty of Social Sciences to promote human rights within Brazil's security forces.

The Director-General met with the governor of the Federal District of Brasilia, Cristovam Buarque, and agreed to establish a US$20,000 UNESCO prize to be given to a young film maker at the end of Brasilia's film festival. Minister of Culture Silvio Tendler recalled UNESCO's important contributions to develop Brazilian cinema. The Organization's donation of equipment 36 years ago led to the birth of a new movement of young directors named Cinema Novo, he said.

The Director-General also suggested holding the next Demos summit in Brasilia in April 1997. This intellectual forum seeks to establish a new political culture and is a continuation of previous meetings held in Contadora, Panama, Montego Bay, Jamaica, Caracas, Venezuela, and Santiago, Chile.