Like, I presume, all forum members, I had been aware of the "leak" through Wiki-leaks of cables from US overseas missions sent to the US State Department across several years up to Feb 2010. I, for one had presumed, wrongly as it turns out, that these would not contain any detailed information of interest to me and would relate primarily to diplomatic matters around War/Peace/Trade/Personal relations etc etc! So I never bothered to investigate them further.

In fact, there are a number which relate to "World Heritage" matters!! There are several ways of accessing these on the Web and I may not have discovered the "best" but this link below should return hits against a search value of "World Heritage" - 382 cables. No doubt you could try other "queries" to be more specific.

I won't attempt to summarise or pick out specific items but they provide an interesting view into the "diplomatic world" behind the WHC and the World Heritage Centre - These include
a. several cables relating to issues likely to emerge at past WHCs indicating the nature of US concerns,
b. ones of meetings with WHC directors such as Bandarin. One has some interesting comments on the issue of allowing development inside WH cities,
c. several relating to WHC membership (an interesting one when Canada "muscles in" at a time when the US had hoped to be a member!! - also interesting in that it refers to this being a step in Canada's long term plan to host the WHC in Quebec)
d. quite a lot about Israeli -Arab issues
e. Background "requests" for support from US for nominations from other countries e.g Burkina Faso in 2009 - an indication of what "goes on" all the time"!

Anyway you can decide how much time you want to put into perusing the list and/or finding any others! http://www.cablegatesearch.net/search.php?q=%22World+Heritage%22&qo=0&qc=0&qto=2010-0 2-28

I never thought of mining wiki leaks for world heritage issues. Could well provide a rich seem. Thanks for flagging it up.

This comment made during a "Dinner at Australian Ambassador's ("residence" presumably to justify the apostrophe) 26 May (2008).
Spain, UK, Canada, Israel, US, Sweden attending." is interesting I think!

"Christine Cameron, the Chairman of the Quebec WH Committee meeting, said that she has become concerned by the growing tendency to politicize and even monetize the issues the WH Committee is dealing with, and minimize the spirit of universality and identification of sites with "outstanding universal value" that was behind the Convention. She stated that China, for example, has been extremely active in promoting several dozen new sites for inscription, which she views as a purely economic move to boost tourism."

2009, Dec 9
U.S. Opportunities At Unesco — Mission UNESCO (United Nations)

"The U.S. now has a unique opportunity to affect UNESCO's future course. Our successful efforts to influence the outcome of the Director-General selection at last September's Executive Board have demonstrated to other member states that the U.S. is a power to be reckoned with in this Organization, and in the person of new Director-General Irina Bokova, we have someone who is well disposed to the U.S. and who is clearly aware of how much she owes us."

2008, Mar 5
Making The Korean DMZ A World Heritage Site — Embassy Paris (France)

"The Belgian Embassy assembled United States, Canadian, Australian, Luxembourg, and South Korean diplomats March 3 to listen to a proposal by Baron Simon-Pierre Nothomb, head of Belgium's association of Korean War Veterans. Nothomb suggested that a fitting memorial to the Korean War dead would be to make the current DMZ a World Heritage site. Untouched by the hand of man for almost sixty years, the DMZ has become a unique natural wilderness. A representative of UNESCO's World Heritage Center reported that he had visited the DMZ in 2004 and could testify to the uniqueness of the site. In his view it could easily qualify as a World Heritage site both because of its historic significance and because of the importance as a nearly pristine biosphere. The World Heritage official reported that UNESCO had attempted to open a dialogue with the two Koreas in 2004 and 2005 on preservation of the DMZ. The North Korean delegation at the time had reported that this was a matter for the North Korean defense ministry and said it would have to refer the matter to Pyongyang. Nothing more was heard of the matter. The South Korean Deputy Permanent Representative commented that the Democratic People's Republic of Korean UNESCO delegation is staffed by officials of the culture ministry. They are probably not even allowed to talk to the defense ministry, he suggested."