Malacca/Melaka, historic city of the Straits of Malacca (Malaysia) have developed over 500 years of trading and cultural exchanges between East and West in the Straits of Malacca. The influences of Asia and Europe have endowed the town with a specific multicultural heritage that is both tangible and intangible. With its government buildings, churches, squares and fortifications, Melaka demonstrates the early stages of this history originating in the 15th-century Malay sultanate and the Portuguese and Dutch periods beginning in the early 16th century. The town constitute a unique architectural and cultural townscape without parallel anywhere in East and Southeast Asia.
Malacca was added to The UNESCO World Cultural Heritage List in the summer of 2008.
