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Azerbaijanâ€™s First Lady attends the celebration of the 65th anniversary of adoption of the Constitution of UNESCO

15 December 2010 14:55 (UTC +04:00)

Mrs. Mehriban Aliyeva attended a presentation ceremony of UNESCO Greek Goodwill Ambassador Mrs. Marianna Vardinoyannisâ€™ book titled â€œLabouring with the challenge of female identityâ€. Director General of UNESCO Irina Bokova highly assessed the book, saying that this book devoted to womenâ€™s role in the society is an important step in order to propagate UNESCO values.

At her speech, Vardinoyannis said that women always played great role in the development of human civilization, and this book was devoted to womenâ€™s participation and work in the establishment and development of the civilization.

Then participants of the ceremony watched a video on activity of the organization. The attendees admired the performance in piano of Azerbaijani composer, Chairperson of the Azerbaijan Composers’ Union Firangiz Alizadeh. UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moonâ€™s message of congratulation was read out at the ceremony. He said that UNESCO contributes to establishment of peace in the world and participates in achievement of inter-civilization and inter-cultural dialogue.

Former Director General of the organization Amadou-Mahtar M`Bow (1974-1987) made a speech at the ceremony. He said that UNESCO successfully continues its mission in order to achieve peace in the world participating in solution of science, education and cultural issues.

Then the artist from Cameroon took part in the anniversary ceremony.

Federico Mayor, former UNESCO director (1987-1999), said UNESCO values have always been topical and the organization contributing to peace in the world has been working for this supreme goal since its foundation.

Former UNESCO director Koisiro Matsuura (1999-2009) said the world needed in such organization to build peace after the World War Two. UNESCO has always served peaceful goals in all periods of its activity. Matsuura said UNESCO continued its mission in 21st century too. â€œUNESCO became a part of our world during 65 yearsâ€, said Davidson Hepburn, chairman of the UNESCO General Conference and said humanist ideas would always dominate in the organizationâ€™s activity.

Eleonora Mitrofanova, Chairperson of the Executive Board of UNESCO, focused attention on the implementation of the education projects among the programs carried out by the organization.

Then a film about the priorities of the organization in 21st century was shown.

UNESCO Director General Irina Bokova made final speech at the anniversary ceremony. She said UNESCO is the worldâ€™s memory and reliable organization protecting material and moral heritage of the humanity. â€œThe activity of this organization is one of the basic principles of peace-building in the worldâ€.

Bokova said UNESCO history was based on great ideas and added that UNESCO family made important efforts for creating these values. She noted that UNESCO takes active part in protection and development of education, sciences and culture in the world and it will be loyal to those principles in this century and make important contributions to the popularization of the cultural heritage in different countries and regions.

UNESCO was founded in November, 1945. UNESCO headquarters is located in Paris. It has 67 bureaus and subunits in different regions of the world. UNESCO counts 191 countries. Azerbaijan is an active member of this respected agency of UN. Azerbaijanâ€™s First Lady Mehriban Aliyeva made great contribution to Azerbaijan-UNESCO cooperation. Due to her contribution, mugham was included in the UNESCOâ€™s list of Masterpieces of Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity in 2003. The International Mugham Center was founded in Baku. Mehriban Aliyev has been UNESCO Good Will Ambassador since 2004 and due to her contribution, a number of cultural monuments of Azerbaijan were included in the UNESCO list of tangible and cultural heritage.