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UNESCO says explosion in Lvov struck buffer zone of World Heritage site

Lvov Mayor Andrey Sadovoy said earlier that several explosions rang out in Lvov when the most recent air raid alert was in effect

PARIS, July 6. /TASS/. One of the explosions that rocked the city of Lvov struck the buffer zone of a World Heritage site, UNESCO said in a statement on Thursday.

The organization didn’t blame any specific person or side of the Ukrainian conflict for the incident, but said the attack on an area protected by the World Heritage Convention "is a violation of this Convention as well as of the 1954 Hague Convention for the Protection of Cultural Property in the Event of Armed Conflict."

The statement said the obligations that state parties of these conventions had undertaken also apply to the buffer zones near the cultural and natural heritage.

"Buffer zones are an additional layer of protection for World Heritage sites and whose boundaries are recognised and approved by the World Heritage Committee," UNESCO said.

Lvov Mayor Andrey Sadovoy said earlier that several explosions rang out in Lvov when the most recent air raid alert was in effect. Maksim Kozitsky, the head of the Lvov Region military administration, said critical infrastructure had been hit, later specifying that an electric substation had been destroyed.