Belarus, Poland to apply for inclusion of Avgustovsky Canal in UNESCO heritage list before year-end :: Charter'97 :: News

Belarus and Poland plan to apply for the inclusion of the shared 19th-century Avgustovsky (Augustowski) Canal in the UNESCO World Heritage List before the end of the year. As Oksana Smotrenko, deputy chief of the Belarusian culture ministry`s Department for the Conservation of Historical and Cultural Heritage and Restoration, told BelaPAN, the UNESCO commission will consider the application in 2006.

The Avgustovsky Canal, built between 1824 and 1839, runs 80 kilometers in Poland and 22 kilometers in the Grodno region, connecting the River Wisla (Vistula) in Poland and the River Neman in Belarus.

The Belarusian section of the canal is scheduled to be restored to its original appearance before July 1, 2006, with a number of facilities, including camps, toilets and retail stalls, as well as a ski slope and an aquatic park, cropping up on its banks.

Four Belarusian sites have already been entered in the UNESCO heritage list - the Belovezhskaya Pushcha national park, the Mir castle, the Radzivill Palace in Nesvizh and the Struve meridian.

The Belarusian authorities plan to seek the inclusion of several more historical sites in the list, namely an Orthodox and a Catholic church in Polotsk, the Kamenets Tower in the Brest region, a church in Grodno, a monastery in Mogilyov and the Brest Fortress, according to Ms. Smotrenko.