Cultural values in the physical environment are explicitly protected by international agreements and their preservation for future generations is specified as a goal of sustainable development. According to Article 9(3) of the Aarhus Convention, environmental organisations have the right to appeal decisions and omissions by authorities relating to the environment. This article examines whether this legal obligation applies in different situations where cultural values in the physical environment may be affected. In order to determine whether such values are covered by this right, the legal concept of the environment is analysed. We then examine how cultural values in the physical environment are protected according to the national law, as well as how rules for environmental organisations’ right of appeal have been implemented and applied by Swedish courts. We conclude that cultural value in the physical environment is an environmental issue in the sense of the Aarhus Convention and thus covered by the right of appeal. In addition, we argue that decisions that “relate to the cultural en- vironment” should be interpreted extensively and that it can be difficult to distinguish cultural values in individual objects from their surrounding envi- ronment and landscape. Decisions that affect individual objects of cultural value can therefore often be covered by the right of appeal according to the Aarhus Convention.