UNESCO to help Egypt restore damaged churches, buildings

Tuesday 27-08-2013 10:52 PM
UNESCO to help Egypt restore damaged churches, buildings

The UNESCO Director-General Irina Bokova attends a news conference after the election at UNESCO headquarters in Paris October 15, 2009. REUTERS/Gonzalo Fuentes

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The United Nations Educational Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) will send a technical team of experts to help Egypt restore buildings with archaeological value and damaged mosques and churches, said Mohamed Sameh, Egypt’s ambassador to the UNESCO.

Sameh, Egypt’s permanent envoy to the UNESCO, said the delegation will work in cooperation with experts from the ministry of antiquities to assess the size of the damage done to a number of mosques, churches, monasteries and buildings of great archaeological value in Egypt.

The delegation will also evaluate the damage done to antiquities at the Mallawi Museum, which was recently ransacked, the Middle East News Agency reported.

The UNESCO’s decision clearly reflects how worried officials are after they were shown in detail the deliberate criminal destruction that targeted Egypt’s heritage and its historical churches and buildings, Sameh stated.

A workshop will be held at the UNESCO headquarters during the coming weeks to discuss ways to protect and restore Egypt’s cultural heritage, he added.

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