Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, what steps her Department is taking to help protect cultural heritage sites at risk from conflict or natural disaster.

The UK’s principal mechanism for safeguarding cultural heritage at risk from conflict and natural disaster internationally is delivered by DCMS’s International Cultural Heritage Protection Programme (ICHP). This operates in 25 ODA-eligible countries predominantly across the Middle East, Africa and South Asia and in Ukraine. The primary initiative is the Cultural Protection Fund (CPF) delivered by the British Council.

In addition, DCMS has funded the project ‘Climate Change & UNESCO Heritage’. Delivered by the UK National Commission for UNESCO, this has developed open-source tools to support UNESCO heritage sites to address climate challenges.