From April 8th to 12th, 2019, a WHITRAP Shanghai delegation composed of Lu Wei, Marie-Noël Tournoux and Simone Ricca, held a series of information and coordination meetings with the World Heritage Centre (WHC) at UNESCO Headquarters in Paris. The meetings focused on the presentation of the activities of the Institute, the development of a coordinated strategy in view of the launch of the 3rd cycle of the Monitoring Report in the Asia Pacific region in September 2019 and the implementation of HUL.

On Monday 8th, WHITRAP met with Jyoti Hosagrahar, Deputy Director, on Thursday 11th, WHITRAP met with Mechtild Rössler, Director of the World Heritage Centre, and the following day with Jing Feng, head of the Asia-Pacific Unit and Petya Totcharova, head of the Policy and Statutory Meetings Unit and their team.

Category 2 Centres (C2Cs) are called to play a more and more relevant role supporting the World Heritage Centre and the State Parties in the implementation of the World Heritage Convention. The Paris meetings were an opportunity to underline the commitment of WHITRAP on the one side, and to reinforce coordination between WHITRAP and WHC on the other.

The Asia Pacific region counts 4 World Heritage C2Cs: WHITRAP and HIST in China, CHEADSEA in Indonesia and the Centre for World Natural Heritage Management and Training for the Asia and Pacific Region in India. WHC underlined the importance of increasing synergies among the different institutes, reinforcing cooperation and sharing best practices and experiences among State Parties in the Region.