<div>CR is achieving success in UNESCO with traditions, while buildings await inscription</div>

Prague - The Czech Republic would like to add another site to its 12 entries of monuments on the UNESCO World Heritage list, but it has not been successful for 13 years. The last success was in 2003 with the entry of the basilica and the Jewish town in Třebíč. Twenty years ago, the Lednice-Valtice area was added to the list. Recently, however, customs and traditions have been experiencing successes - since 2005, five have been inscribed, the last of which, puppetry, was presented at the committee meeting in Ethiopia this Thursday. It was a joint nomination with Slovakia.

The nomination for inclusion on the UNESCO list is preceded by an indicative list of monuments, among which the real estate is declared as national cultural monuments. There is also a national list for intangible cultural heritage, which currently has 14 items. UNESCO authorities evaluate both types of cultural heritage separately; the intangible was assessed now. Puppetry was added to the Slovácko verbuňk (2005), the Masopust processions and masks in Hlinecko (2010), falconry (2010 - the Czech Republic as part of a multinational nomination coordinated by the United Arab Emirates), and the rides of kings in the southeast of the Czech Republic (2011).

Among the traditions that the Czech Republic would like to nominate are, for example, the Wallachian odzemek, the technology of blue dyeing, traditional healing procedures and the legacy of Vincenz Priessnitz, the Bethlehem path in Třešť, or the production of Christmas ornaments made from glass beads.

Experts have also prepared a list of nearly two dozen tangible monuments, which the UNESCO World Committee approves every spring. However, the state does not want to specify which has the best chance, as nominations and assessments of candidates by the UNESCO committee also involve diplomacy. In the case of Czech candidates, the most frequently discussed are joint nominations of two countries - the Ore Mountains with Germany or the monuments of Great Moravia with Slovakia.

The submission of a nomination is the result of years or even decades of preparation because once a nomination is rejected by the UNESCO committee, it cannot be submitted again.

In April of this year, Saxony withdrew its nomination request for the Ore Mountains in agreement with the Czech side, stating that it needed to be reworked. It has now been agreed that the request will be submitted at the beginning of 2018. There have also been recent disputes about a broad nomination of European spa towns. Among the originally considered 16 places, in addition to the West Bohemian spa triangle, were Luhačovice, but later the nomination shrank, and the Moravian spas were dropped.

Together with Slovenia, a nomination of the works of the Slovenian architect Jože Plečnik is also being prepared, in the Czech Republic the author of, for example, the Church of the Most Sacred Heart of Our Lord in Prague’s Vinohrady. The nomination of Plečnik's buildings consists of six monuments in Slovenia and the church in Vinohrady.

The monuments that could soon apply for inscription also include the mentioned monuments of Great Moravia and the Třeboň carpentry. Further nomination documentation is being prepared for the transmitter and hotel on Ještěd, the Terezin fortress, the expansion of the historic center of Prague, technical monuments related to hop processing in Žatec, and the cultural landscape associated with the horse farm in Kladruby. Also on the list are Bethlehem near Kuks, Karlštejn Castle, industrial complexes in Ostrava, Renaissance houses in Slavonice, and a hand paper mill in Velké Losiny.