WHC puts Medieval Monuments in Kosovo in danger list
Xinhua - July 17, 2006

The 30th session of the World Heritage Committee (WHC) here extended Friday Serbia's Decani Monastery and put it on the List of World heritage in Danger.

The 21-member committee also extended Andorra's site of Madriu- Perafita-Claror Valley by adding a buffer zone to the property, which was listed in 2004.

These inscriptions end additions and changes to the World Heritage List, which now numbers 830 sites, and danger list numbers 31.

Three groups of churches, the Patriarchate of Pec Monastery, Gracanica Monastery and the Church of the Virgin of Ljevisa were added to Serbia's Decani Monastery, inscribed on the World Heritage List in 2004.

The site is to be called Medieval Monuments in Kosovo and put on the List of World Heritage in Danger.

The extended property, mainly dating from the 13th and 14th centuries, was also placed on the danger List due to difficulties in its management and conservation resulting from the region's political instability.

The WHC requested that Serbia work together with UNESCO programs, the United Nations Mission to Kosovo (UNMIK) and the Provisional Institutions of Self-Government in Kosovo in managing the site.

The four edifices of the site reflect the high points of the Byzantine-Romanesque ecclesiastical culture that developed in the Balkans between the 13th and 17th centuries with its distinct style of wall painting. The style played a decisive role in subsequent Balkan art.

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