Belarus has become the latest country to enter into an agreement with the United States that commits the two governments to protect and preserve cemeteries, memorials, historic sites, places of worship, and archives related to all peoples, with a focus on those that were victims of genocide during World War II and are no longer able to protect and preserve properties without assistance.
The agreement was signed in New York this week by Belarus Foreign Minister Vladimir Makei and Lesley Weiss, the Chair of the U.S. Commission for the Preservation of America’s Heritage Abroad, who negotiated the agreement for the U.S..
The accord “pledges that there will be no discrimination against the cultural property of any group or against any group in its efforts to preserve property of cultural importance,” the Commission said in a statement. “It also provides for cooperation in preserving sites.”
This is the twenty-fifth such agreement the U.S. has entered into with nations of eastern and central Europe and the Caucasus. The other countries are: the Czech Republic, Romania, Ukraine, Slovenia, Slovakia, Moldova, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Latvia, Lithuania, Bulgaria, Macedonia, Estonia, Germany, Austria, Hungary, Poland, Armenia, Albania, Serbia, Montenegro, Croatia, Georgia, Italy, and Kosovo.
The Commission for the Preservation of America’s Heritage Abroad was established by Federal law in 1985 in response to the concern of the American orthodox Jewish community that burial places were being lost because of the annihilation of European Jewry during the Holocaust and repression of religious freedom under Communism.
In addition to obtaining assurances regarding the preservation of cultural properties, the Commission contracts for field surveys to identify sites and conducts, assists with, and encourages privately-funded projects to mark, restore, and preserve cultural sites.
As noted on the Commission’s web site, the state-to-state bilateral agreements on the protection and preservation of certain cultural properties generally pledge the signatory countries to:
— Help protect and preserve properties, including places of worship, monuments, cemeteries, and related archives that are important to the cultural heritage of their residents and former residents.
— Cooperate in identifying such properties, particularly endangered and significant properties.
— Ensure equal treatment of all cultural groups in property preservation and access policies.
— Cooperate in ensuring the protection and preservation of properties of groups that are not able to ensure protection and preservation of the site on their own.
— Establish a joint cultural heritage commission with the U.S. for the bilateral efforts