The historical center of Odessa was included in the UNESCO World Heritage List.

This was reported by the Minister of Culture and Information Policy Oleksandr Tkachenko.

“The historic center of the port city of Odesa is included in the UNESCO World Heritage List under threat,” the minister said.

As the mayor of Odesa, Gennadiy Trukhanov, noted, it took ten years for this

Why is it important?

UNESCO World Heritage is outstanding cultural and natural values that are considered the heritage of all mankind. These values are listed in the UNESCO List. The status of a heritage object provides the following advantages:

• additional guarantees of preservation and integrity of unique natural and cultural complexes;
• increases the prestige of the territories and institutions that take care of them;
• promotes the popularization of objects included in the List and the development of alternative types of nature use (primarily, ecological tourism);
• ensures priority in attracting financial funds for the support of World Cultural and Natural Heritage sites, primarily from the World Heritage Fund;
• contributes to the organization of monitoring and control over the state of conservation of natural and cultural objects.

First of all, we hope that this step will really save historic Odessa, first of all, from Odessans themselves, who are destroying the facades of historical buildings with balconies, illegal constructions, signs of shops and establishments, and even the complete deliberate destruction of entire buildings for the construction of new high-rise buildings.