The Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism announced on Monday that South Korea was elected to UNESCO's Intergovernmental Committee for the Protection and Promotion of the Diversity of Cultural Expressions.
 
The election came during the sixth ordinary session of the Conference of Parties to the 2005 Convention on the Protection and Promotion of the Diversity of Cultural Expressions held at the UNESCO headquarters in Paris between Monday and Thursday of last week.
 
South Korea will carry out duties for four years from June of this year in the committee's Asia-Pacific group which also includes China and Indonesia.
 
The 2005 convention has 145 signatories. The intergovernmental committee is tasked with promoting the objectives and implementation of the convention. It is made up of 24 member countries chosen from six continental groups around the world.
 
South Korea became a signatory to the convention in 2007. Seven years later, it enacted a law on protecting and promoting cultural diversity.
 
In a bid to promote cultural diversity, expand opportunities for cultural expression and strengthen cultural exchanges, the culture ministry has been organizing every year weeklong events marking cultural diversity.