Korea has been elected to a four-year term as a member of the Intergovernmental Committee for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage, a UNESCO body that helps to protect the world's intangible cultural heritage items. The choice was made during the fifth meeting of the committee, which took place from June 2 to June 4 at UNESCO headquarters in Paris, France. Korea won 126 votes from the 142 nations present at the meeting.

The Intergovernmental Committee for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage consists of 24 members and is responsible for making decisions about the listing of UNESCO intangible cultural heritage items. By becoming a so-called "states member," Korea can now participate in the decisions regarding the Representative List and the Urgent Safeguarding List of intangible cultural heritage items.

States Members to the committee are elected for a term of four years, and every two years, the General Assembly renews half of them. The seats on the committee are distributed among the six UNESCO electoral groups in proportion to the number of states parties from each group. The committee is also in charge of making operational guidelines concerning the intangible cultural heritage convention, approving international financial assistance, drawing up budget plans and reviewing and summarizing reports from participating countries.

Korea had earlier been a states member of the committee from 2008 to 2012 and this is now the second time for Korea to be elected to the position. The member nations' choice of Korea is based on Korea's ongoing efforts to protect and preserve intangible cultural assets across the world and to support other countries in their conservation efforts as well.




By Limb Jae-un
Korea.net Staff Writer
jun@korea.kr