UNESCO has announced more than a dozen World Heritage Sites this year.
This year’s entries include an ancient Chinese port city, an iconic boulevard in Spain, an eight-century-old Indian temple, an archeological site in Turkey that dates back more than seven thousand years.
The selection puts China near the top of the list of countries with the most World Heritage sites — right after Italy, which was granted another World Heritage site this year for a series of 14th century frescos in Padua.
Other new sites include the Korean Tidal Flats, the mountainous Kaeng Krachan forest in Thailand, and the Colchic Rainforests and Wetlands that lie along the Black Sea in western Georgia, the last remains of a landscape belt that stretched across Eurasia nearly ten million years ago.
In Iran, the Trans-Iranian Railway, which started construction in 1929, linking the Persian Gulf and the Caspian Sea, has been recognized in 1929.
The Dutch Water Line is a 17th-century defenses against flooding that has now been elevated to World Heritage status.
In India, Telangana’s beautifully decorated Ramappa Temple dates back to the 13th century and is thought to have taken 40 years to complete