Advertising Suffocating Russian Capital: Heritage Official

The Russian capital Moscow is losing its cultural face due to a chaotic "patchwork" of illegal banner advertising covering major landmarks, the city's heritage committee said Friday.

Pushkin Square, a historic and popular site in the centre is especially crowded by advertisements which cover entire buildings.

Yoga is a World Heritage To Be Utilized by All: Rajan Zed
Zed, President of Universal Society of Hinduism, said that although introduced and nourished by Hinduism, yoga was a world heritage to be utilized by all.

A thousand banners are illegally installed in a UNESCO-protected zone near the Kremlin, deputy director of Moscow's heritage committee Alexander Filyaev said at a conference.

Advertisements are often installed on the pretext of facade renovations, but "construction scaffolding stands for years without any renovation works, deteriorating the buildings further," he said.

An investigation of Moscow's boulevard ring, a tree-lined promenade in the centre, revealed that "only two percent of advertisement displays" have the proper permits from the city's heritage committee, he said.

China Seeks Intangible Heritage Status for Acupuncture
China is seeking to list acupuncture, the procedure of inserting and manipulating needles into various points on the body to relieve pain, as a UNESCO world intangible cultural heritage.

"We have asked acting mayor Vladimir Resin to punish the violators and put an end to these infractions," he said.

"I'd like to ask Muscovites to help out the city hall by taking pictures of Moscow's streets and sending them in," Filyaev said.

World Heritage List to Feature Mediterranean Diet
The UNESCO World Heritage list, which celebrates sites ranging from the Great Barrier Reef to the Tower of London is all set to feature the Mediterranean diet.

President Dmitry Medvedev in September dramatically sacked Yury Luzhkov, Moscow's mayor for the past 18 years, saying he had lost confidence in him, replacing him with Luzhkov's former deputy Resin.

The new interim administration has quickly announced a number of symbolic measures contradicting the former mayor's policies and mooted moving a giant statue of Peter the Great from the centre of the capital.

UNESCO Heritage Honour Sought by Pacific Islands
UNESCO's top world heritage list may have a new entrant as Ttirty-two natural wonders and cultural treasures including the remote Bikini Atoll in the Pacific are competing

Architecture preservation group Arkhnadzor, which has constantly battled city administration over destruction of architectural landmarks said they have now been invited to a round table with the City Hall.

"We will ask to stop the projects threatening old Moscow," said group coordinator Konstantin Mikhailov, Interfax reported.

Source-AFP