On September 28, 2017 the XXII meeting of the National Commission of Ukraine for UNESCO was held at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The key topic of the meeting was the situation in the territory of Crimea occupied by Russia in the fields of UNESCO’s competence.

The member of the National Commission of Ukraine for UNESCO, the Chairman of the Mejlis of the Crimean Tatar People Refat Chubarov informed about recent blatant violations of the rights of the local population in the territory of the occupied peninsula – illegal verdicts to the Deputy Chairman of the Mejlis of the Crimean Tatar People Ilmi Umerov as well as the Ukrainian journalist Mykola Semena.

“In our work in UNESCO we must always keep in mind that a part of the territory of Ukraine is occupied and draw attention of our partners to this fact. We will do everything possible to prevent any attempt to use UNESCO for legitimizing of the illegal annexation of Crimea,” underlined Sergiy Kyslytsya, Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs, Chairperson of the National Commission of Ukraine to UNESCO.

The members of the National Commission of Ukraine for UNESCO paid particular attention to the monitoring of the state of preservation of the cultural heritage sites in the territory of the occupied peninsula, the preparation of a register of movable and immovable Ukrainian heritage objects located in the museums in Crimea as well as accession of Ukraine to the Second Protocol to the Convention for the Protection of Cultural Property in the Event of Armed Conflict (1954).

Participants of the meeting discussed the preparation of nominations of the Archeologic site Kamyana Mohyla and Historic Center of the city of Chernihiv for the UNESCO World Heritage List.

The Commission decided to set up a competition for the most active school participating in the UNESCO Associated Schools Network Project.

The best practices of Ukrainian participants in the UNESCO Global Network of Learning Cities and UNESCO Creative Cities Network were presented at the meeting.