UNESCO commemorates slain Israeli Prime Minister and peace-maker Yitzhak Rabin

Paris, 30 October

• © UNESCOMichel Claude
• Tolerance Square designed by Israeli artist Dani Karavan and dedicated to Yitzhak Rabin.

The Director-General of UNESCO, Koïchiro Matsuura, will pay tribute to Yitzhak Rabin, the late Israeli Prime Minister and signatory of the Oslo Peace Accords, on 4 November. The commemorative ceremony at Organization Headquarters will mark the 14th anniversary of his assassination.

The ceremony will be held in the presence of Ron Huldai, Mayor of Tel Aviv, at UNESCO’s Square of Tolerance which is dedicated to the memory of Yitzhak Rabin. Also present will be Irina Bokova, Director-General elect of UNESCO, alongside Israel’s Ambassador to France, Daniel Shek and Noa Karavan, daughter of UNESCO Artist for Peace Dani Karavan who designed the Square of Tolerance.

Yitzhak Rabin, the first Israeli Prime Minister to sign an agreement with Palestinian representatives, was awarded the UNESCO Félix Houphouët-Boigny Peace Prize in 1993 alongside, Yasser Arafat, Chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organization, and Shimon Peres who served as Israel’s Foreign Minister at the time. The three leaders were awarded the Nobel Peace Prize one year later.

The Mayor of Tel Aviv will be visiting France within the framework of the 100th anniversary celebration of the founding of the city, whose modernist architectural buildings and town plan were inscribed on UNESCO’s World Heritage List in 2003 as the “White City of Tel-Aviv -- the Modern Movement”.

• Author(s):UNESCOPRESS
• Source:Media Advisory No.2009-62
• 31-10-2009