Cold Winter Deserts of Turan

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Cold Winter Deserts of Turan: A Transboundary World Heritage Site in Central Asia

The Cold Winter Deserts of Turan, inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2023, encompasses a vast expanse of arid landscapes stretching over 1,500 kilometers across Central Asia's temperate zone. This transboundary property, comprising fourteen distinct component parts, lies between the Caspian Sea and the towering Turanian high mountains.

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UNESCO Description of the World Heritage Site

This transnational property comprises fourteen component parts found across arid areas of Central Asia’s temperate zone between the Caspian Sea and the Turanian high mountains. The area is subject to extreme climatic conditions with very cold winters and hot summers, and boasts an exceptionally diverse flora and fauna that has adapted to the harsh conditions. The property also represents a considerable diversity of desert ecosystems, spanning a distance of more than 1,500 kilometres from East to West. Each of the component parts complements the others in terms of biodiversity, desert types, and ongoing ecological processes.

Encyclopedia Record: Turan

Turan is a historical region in Central Asia. The term is of Iranian origin and may refer to a particular prehistoric human settlement, a historic geographical region, or a culture. The original Turanians were an Iranian tribe of the Avestan age.

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