Unesco

On Wednesday, 18 December 2013, the Intergovernmental Committee for the Protection of Cultural Property in the Event of Armed Conflict unanimously re-elected Benjamin Goes as its Chairperson for a one-year term.

In his second and final term as head of the Committee, Mr Goes faces a number of challenges: developing synergies at all levels (including with the World Heritage Committee), implementing measures to enable the Committee to add immovable properties other than those on the World Heritage List to the List of Cultural Property under Enhanced Protection, accelerating ratifications of the Second Protocol of 1999 to the 1954 Hague Convention for the Protection of Cultural Property in the Event of Armed Conflict, creating a specific distinctive emblem for cultural property under enhanced protection, and developing a comprehensive plan of action for situations of armed conflict.

This Chairpersonship will be particularly important given the significance of 2014 as the centenary of the outbreak of World War One as well as the 60th anniversary of the Hague Convention of 1954 and the 15th anniversary of the Convention's Second Protocol of 1999.