Britain's Lake District joins UNESCO's World Heritage list

July 10 (UPI) -- UNESCO's World Heritage Committee awarded World Heritage status to Britain's Lake District on Monday at its meeting in Krakow, Poland.

The World Heritage Committee identifies natural and man-made cultural locations for their special significance, placing them on a list known as inscription. The Taj Mahal, the Grand Canyon and the Great Wall of China are previous recipients of the honor.

The landscape of the Lake District has been "greatly appreciated from the 18th century onwards by the Picturesque and later Romantic movements, which celebrated it in paintings, drawings and words. It also inspired an awareness of the importance of beautiful landscapes and triggered early efforts to preserve them," a UNESCO statement said.

Helen McLagen of the U.K. National Commission for UNESCO, celebrated the decision to include the Lake District, which she called "a priceless and irreplaceable asset not only to the U.K. but to humanity as a whole."

Also recognized for inscription status on Monday were Rio de Janeiro's Valango Harbor Archeological Site, which includes a stone wharf built in 1811 for the landing of enslaved Africans, and Turkey's Temple of Aphrodite, built in the 3rd century and the site of marble art installations made from nearby quarries.

The committee maintains a separate list of world heritage sites it regards as "in danger," and last week added the Old Town portion of the city of Hebron, West Bank. The decision to identify the site as Palestinian, although it contains a holy site known to Jews as the Tomb of the Patriarchs and to Muslims as the Ibrahimi mosque, outraged Israeli leaders.