Tehran, Aug 26, IRNA – International applications have been filed with the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) to register the Iranian musical instrument Lute in 2019, said head and spokesman of Iran’s House of Music.

Cultural Heritage, Handicrafts and Tourism Organization has filed an application for Lute and will do the same for Santur, said Dariush Pirniakan

The application filed with the UNESCO for Lute consists of a 10-minute video clip of playing the instrument, he added.

According to the official, some instruments may be registered jointly with other countries. For example, Kamancheh (Iranian version of violin) is registered along with Azerbaijan Republic and Ney (Iranian flute) will be jointly registered, but the instruments and other cultural heritage that mainly originate from Iran, are solely registered by Iran.

Referring to other countries’ request for joint registration, he added that Iran welcomes them for joint registration because this indicates that we have shared history and land with other countries.

For example, the request of 12 countries for joint registration of Nowrooz with Iran implies that they were part of Iran sometime in the past, he said.

He added that another advantage of joint registration is that it does not fill our quota, thus we can file another case in the same year.

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