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| An old heritage building in Ahmedabad. |
Take for example the latest publication United 4Heritage: Cultural Diversity Under Attack, which highlights the loss of heritage in war zones. Welcome as this is, it’s worth pointing out that the vast majority of current active hot spots are in West Asia, with almost all the publicised losses of cultural heritage. What’s absent here is any study on how low-level societal violence/heavy resource competition can be equally, if not more damaging to such heritage. [...] there is limited focus on heritage-destruction in countries outside conflict zones, such as India. It is the implicit assumption that ‘heritage is destroyed only in conflict zones’ that is deeply disturbing.The authors argue that this focus on conflict antiquities "ensures that the real problem stays ignored"and that governments and philanthropists channel their money mostly towards ‘high visibility’ zones, such as West Asia.
Thus, if we’re not being either ‘protected’ or ‘projected’, but, rather being neglected by Unesco, what exactly is the point of being part of it, or indeed contributing to it?In India, theauthors argue, "we need whatever scarce resources we have diverted to protecting and projecting our own rather than subsidising the agenda of others who anyway get more than their fair share of attention".
those representing the interests of collectors, museums and the trade that raised the exact same issues about the credibility of these fantastical numbers early on have become targets for abuse from some of the very same individuals Press acknowledges for their contributions in exposing the truth.It seems that when academics question the false news they get a hearing, when it is the informed man in the street, they are treated with abuse and put-downs. As Peter Tompa rightly points out, there is an elephant in the room that is being avoided in the article:
Who was responsible for "weaponizing" antiquities in the first place? The ISIS killing machine was bad enough to justify military intervention, particularly given its terror threats not only in the region but to Europe and the US as well. Of course, the answer is quite apparent to those who represent the interests of collectors, museums and the trade. It is the State Department's Cultural Heritage Center, which worked along with ASOR, the State Department contractor mentioned in the article, and the Antiquities Coalition, a well-funded archaeological advocacy group with ties to ASOR, the Archaeological Institute of America, as well as authoritarian Arab regimes.Hipster Internet Art Newsletter Raises Alarm About Antiquities being "Weaponized" for Political Purposes
Gandharan period stone statues were discovered in a rubbish pile, visible from the street, at the National Museum in Karachi, Pakistan. The statues, which are said to be from the 3rd-5th century, have traveled from their original site, somewhere in Northwest Pakistan, to the Awami Colony in Karachi, where they were recovered from a Pakistani smuggling ring in 2012 , and finally to a trash heap at the National Museum. Two of the five statues were used to decorate the doorway of the antiquities director-general’s personal office, the others were tossed into a rubbish heap outside. There was no information on what happened to the other 390 “rare objects” recovered in the Awami Colony raid.One wonders whether the precious statues were hidden below rubbish so that one night a truck would appear in the museum courtyard and corrupt museum authorities can profit from their sale. The treatment of the Buddhist statues highlights the general neglect of antiquities and cultural heritage sites rampant under the archeology and antiquities departments of Pakistan. Not only these statues, but many other artifacts have been neglected and improperly stored.
