“There are not many World Heritage sites in the Pacific,” said Bikini liaison Jack Niedenthal Thursday. “I hope they will want to include Bikini.”
He and Australia-based consultant Nicole Baker, who worked on the 86-page nomination proposal to UNESCO’s World Heritage program, both believe that a listing by World Heritage would increase Bikini’s visibility internationally, boosting demand by people wanting to visit the former nuclear test site that, until recently, was a popular scuba dive attraction.
A 12-year-old scuba dive business, that featured diving on World War II warships sunk by nuclear tests, was halted last year when the government’s national airline ran into plane difficulties, repeatedly stranding divers on this isolated atoll.
The World Heritage nomination involves a difficult, multi-level review process, Baker said. A “technical assessment” of Bikini’s submission will be complete by the end of March. If the proposal passes that initial review, then it goes for a more detailed review by 20-30 U.N. Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization professional reviewers, according to Baker.
That review leads to the dispatch of a UNESCO team to the Marshall Islands and Bikini in late 2009 for an on-site review. “They will want to see management systems in place (for monitoring Bikini) and the intent to implement plans (outlined in the World Heritage proposal),” said Baker. A key element of the UNESCO review is to see if the “state” — in this case the Marshall Islands national and Bikini local governments — “are serious about implementing the plan,” she said.
These evaluations funnel recommendations to the World Heritage committee, which then decides whether to reject or accept the nomination, Baker said.
That decision won’t be known until June next year. But all of these reviews depend on the Bikini nomination passing the initial technical assessment next month.
Baker described the Bikini nomination as “ground breaking,” explaining that the World Heritage program is Europe-centered based largely on recognition of monuments dating back many centuries. “There are only a few 20th century sites, few are in the Pacific and few have confronting values,” she said. This is the first north Pacific site nominated for World Heritage recognition.
She described Bikini’s status as a nuclear test ground zero as “nuclear colonialism,” which in World Heritage language is a confronting issue in a similar way to World Heritage sites marking Hiroshima and the German extermination camp of Auschwitz.
To be successful, the submission must demonstrate that the site has value that transcends national boundaries.
Because of its role in the nuclear arms race during the Cold War, Bikini clearly passes this test, she said. Bikini was the site of the first United States post-World War II atomic blasts and ultimately saw 23 bomb tests through 1958.
“Bikini is the only world famous, world class place out here,” Niedenthal said. “It’s got nuclear test buildings, craters and a bathing suit.”
Bikini has been nominated under two criteria for World Heritage recognition, which require that it be:
• An outstanding example of a type of building, architectural or technological ensemble or landscape which illustrates significant stage(s) in human history.
• Directly or tangibly associated with events or living traditions, with ideas, or with beliefs, with artistic and literary works of outstanding universal significance.
“Nuclear bomb tests at Bikini Atoll shaped the history of the people of Bikini, the history of the Marshall Islands and the history of the entire world,” said the statement of “outstanding universal value” in the Bikini proposal. “Bikini Atoll is distinctly 20th century heritage, standing testimony to the dawn of the nuclear age, the start of the Cold War and the era of nuclear colonialism — stages in human history of global significance.”
