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A special committee with the United Nations\u2019s cultural agency says Australia\u2019s Great Barrier Reef should be placed on a list of World Heritage sites that should be designated as \u201cin danger.\u201d <\/P>
The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization\u2019s World Heritage Committee, or UNESCO, recommended the 2,300-kilometer-long coral reef system should be placed on the list because it has deteriorated due to climate change. <\/P>
Australian officials denounced the recommendation. Environment Minister Sussan Ley said Tuesday that Canberra opposes the designation and accused the World Heritage Committee of \u201ca backflip on previous assurances\u201d and that it would not take such an action before its formal meeting next month. <\/P>
Ley said she and Foreign Minister Marise Payne had spoken by phone to UNESCO Director-General Audrey Azoulay about the decision, which she called \u201cflawed\u201d and a decision influenced by politics. <\/P>
\u201cThis sends a poor signal to those nations who are not making the investments in reef protection that we are making,\u201d she said. <\/P>
But Richard Leck, the head of oceans for World Wide Fund for Nature-Australia, said in a statement the recommendation \u201cis clear and unequivocal that the Australian government is not doing enough to protect our greatest natural asset, especially on climate change.\u201d <\/P>
The Great Barrier Reef is the world\u2019s biggest coral reef system that brings an estimated $4.8 billion annually in tourism revenue. <\/P>
Climate change has driven temperatures in the Coral Sea higher in recent decades, leading to three mass \u201cbleaching\u201d events since 2015, destroying at least half of the Reef\u2019s vibrant corals and prompting the Australian government to downgrade its long term outlook to \u201cvery poor.\u201d <\/P>
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Source: Voice of America<\/P>
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A special committee with the United Nations\u2019s cultural agency says Australia\u2019s Great Barrier Reef should be placed on a list of World Heritage sites that should be designated as \u201cin danger.\u201d The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organ…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"yoast_head":"\n