The Bikin River Valley nomination prepared from 2009 to 2016 by the Natural Heritage Protection Fund with the support of the Amur Branch of the World Wide Fund for Nature and transferred to the World Heritage Centre on the 30^th of January, 2017, underwent the technical assessment of completeness.

The information that was requested by the IUCN in addition to the transboundary Russian-Mongolian nomination “Landscapes of Dauria”, which had been referred back by the decision of the 39^th Session of the World Heritage Committee, has been transferred to the World Heritage Centre. The issue of inscribing the Landscapes of Dauria on the List will be reconsidered during the 41^st Session of the Committee in July 2017. 

After the necessary endorsements with the Russian Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment, the package of the documents for representing the Bikin River Valley territory (Primorsky Kray) on the World Heritage List has been transferred to the World Heritage Centre. The territory is nominated within the boundaries of the Bikin National Park created in 2015 in order to extend the Central Sikhote-Alin site.

The World Heritage Committee completing its 40th session which began in Istanbul from 10 to 17 July 2016.

The Committee finished its deliberations, including discussions concerning the budget and revision to the Operational Guidelines of the World Heritage Convention. The Committee also elected the members of its Bureau, which coordinates the work of the Committee during its sessions. The new members of the Bureau for the 41st session are Angola, Kuwait, Peru, Portugal and Republic of Korea as Vice-Chairpersons, with Prof. Jacek Purchla (Poland) as Chairperson and Mr Juma Muhammad (United Republic of Tanzania) as Rapporteur.

41st session will be held from 2 to 12 July 2017 in Kraków, Poland.

The World Heritage Committee, meeting in Istanbul, Turkey from 10 to 17 July has inscribed 21 sites on the World Heritage List. They include 12 cultural sites, six natural and three mixed sites. The World Heritage List now numbers 1052 sites in 165 countries.