Narinjara News, January 19, 2023

Mrauk-U was founded in AD 1430 by King Min Saw Mon of Rakhine,and ruled by successive Rakhine monarchs for 354 years. Advocates want theancient Rakhine city of Mrauk-U to be included in the UNESCO World HeritageList, to ensure long-term preservation of this priceless ancient historicalheritage.

In order for Mrauk-U to be included in the World HeritageList, the Mrauk-U Archaeology Department has worked to raise awareness amongthe local public, and also prepared for presentations of historical recordst toa future field survey .But there has been no further communication from UNESCO,a person who tried to get Mrauk-U on the World Heritage List told Narinjara.

The final proposal to add Mrauk-U to the World Heritage Listwas submitted to the UNESCO headquarters in France on December 30th, 2021.However, UNESCO did not respond to whether

Myanmar’s request would be acted upon, given the politicalcrisis and ongoing conflict in Rakhine and the whole of Myanmar.

Daw Khin Than, chairman of the Mrauk-U Heritage ConservationCommittee said “ UNESCO may not be able to visit the site because of thepolitical situation.”

Italian Professor Massimo Sarti, an expert of waterresources, visited Mrauk-U from February 9th to 15th, 2021, to do a pilot fieldsurvey for the inclusion of Mrauk-U in the World Heritage List. At the endof his 7-day field survey, Sarti commented that dumping garbage in streams andditches in Mrauk-U and the presence of squatters in the ancient city areascould make it difficult to put Mrauk-U on the UNESCO World Heritage List.

But even if this was cleaned up, Mrauk-U HeritageConservation Committee does not seem to be aware that their ill-timedapplication for world heritage recognition just after the 2021 coup isfundamentally flawed. That basic obstacle is the fact that the Military Councilis not recognized by the UN General Assembly as the legitimate government, andthe Myanmar seat continues be

categorized for the 2 nd year as “vacant.”

Any world heritage agreement can only legally be signed byUNESCO with a government recognized by the UN headquarters in New York. So ineffect the Myanmar application signed by the junta is a non-starter.