This article in DW.com highlights how UNESCO is proposing adding sites in the high seas to the World Heritage List, a campaign sponsored by Khaled bin Sultan Living Oceans Foundation. These natural wonders are in international waters. Heritage status could help protect them against pollution and overfishing.

UNESCO seeks to protect natural wonders in the high seas

DW.com
August 8, 2016
By Brigette Osterath

While I was struggling to finish my scuba diving training, I came across a statement on the internet: “Scuba diving is like entering a different planet.” That settled it for me: I never thought about dropping out of my diving course ever again – and finally got my certificate.

Sometimes, the internet is indeed right, I found out later.

Many people might think there is nothing down there in the oceans but rocks, darkness and a lot of water. In fact you find a whole new world, full of life – stretching as far as the eye can reach.

Most of these unique places, though, cannot be protected, because they belong to what is known as the “high seas”.

“Half of our planet is beyond national jurisdiction,” Fanny Douvere, coordinator of the World Heritage Marine Programme, told DW. “It’s ocean, and belongs to nobody. So it is very much the wild west: Everybody can go there and extract resources.”…