A conservation architect, Zaki Aslan is the Director of the International Centre for the Study of the Preservation and Restoration of Cultural Property, ICCROM-ATHAR Regional Conservation Centre in Sharjah in the UAE.
Aslan and his dedicated team at ICCROM ATHAR work tirelessly to develop and support programming for cultural heritage professionals in the MENA region. Aslan directs programmes, often in challenging environments such as Iraq and Sudan, to ensure that museum and cultural professionals working in some of the hardest to research areas of the region have access to proper training courses and other resources
Since 2003, Aslan has been the managing ICCROM’s ATHAR Programme (Conservation of Cultural Heritage in the Arab Region). His focus is on providing both technical advice and extensive training programmes to the Arab States in the Mediterranean and the Gulf countries. His and the organisation’s expertise lies in heritage conservation, management and planning, World Heritage procedures, national heritage strategies and governance, as well as education and curricula development at graduate level.
Aslan holds a Ph.D. in Heritage Conservation and Management from the University College London (UCL), U.K., and a M.Sc. degree in Conservation of the Built Environment from the University of Montreal in Canada (1991).