A Chinese terracotta warrior has been greeting diplomats from the world, and the site of Peking Man has been telling the history about Chinese ancestors.

The warrior, from the Qin Dynasty some 2,000 years ago, and the historic site were among 16 photos at an exhibition that opened at the UN headquarters in New York on Wednesday.

The Chinese cultural relics featured on these photos are listed as World Heritage sites for their unique qualities as examples of Chinese cultural heritage.

The photo exhibition, with the theme of "Our Past, Our Future," was jointly sponsored by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) and the Chinese Mission to the United Nations.

The photo show also featured cultural heritage from Algeria, France, Jordan, Peru and Russia.

At the opening ceremony, Mounir Bouchenaki, assistant director-general of the UN cultural agency, praised China for "presenting to the world the most important and most representative cultural heritage."

Bouchenaki also announced that China will host a meeting of the World Heritage Committee next year in Suzhou of east China's Jiangsu Province.

Wang Yingfan, the Chinese permanent representative to the United Nations, said the photos presented by his mission at the show represented China's major significant archaeological discoveries in the 20th century.

On display were photos of the site of the 700,000-year-old Peking Man and the world-famous terracotta warriors from the tomb of the first emperor of the Qin Dynasty, who lived some 2,000 years ago.

(China Daily December 6, 2002)