Istanbul: The World Heritage Committee on Sunday evening agreed to put 12 new sites on the World Heritage List before ending its 40th session in Turkey's Istanbul city. With nine others already approved on Friday, the session has placed a total of 21 out of 27 nominations for this year on the prestigious list, Xinhua news agency reported.

With the 21 newly added -- 12 cultural sites, six natural and three mixed ones -- the heritage list has now 1,052 sites in 165 countries. The state of conservation of 155 properties was examined as well during the session, with five in Libya inscribed on the List of World Heritage in Danger along with one in Uzbekistan and another in Mali.