Tag: Iraq

Iraqi Museum Objects Seized in Syria

The AP is reporting (via Syria’s official news agency) that Syrian customs officials have seized 40 objects stolen from the National Museum in Baghdad.

The report quotes the chief of the customs department, Nabil al-Sayyouri, as saying the pieces were seized at al-Tanaf crossing on the Syrian-Iraqi border. They were hidden in a bag in an Iraqi crossing into Syria. The artifacts include different-sized glassware and clay tools.

Al-Sayyouri said the seized pieces were “rare and would be handed back to Iraq.”

This is the third smuggling attempt aborted in less than two months by Syrian customs officials. Last month, the Syrian Cultural Ministry handed Iraq back some 700 pieces of looted priceless antiquities seized inside Syria.

Syria really seems to be taking the lead on policing its borders, with a number of important seizures in recent months.

Questions or Comments? Email me at derek.fincham@gmail.com

Can the West do More to Protect Iraqi Antiquities?


Dr. Bahaa Mayah, a special adviser to Iraq’a Minister of Tourism and Antiquities, has strongly criticized the response of the West to the trade in looted or stolen antiquities originating from Iraq. Dr. Mayah held a press conference yesterday at the British Museum, and argued it was the occupying forces’ responsibility to retrieve the valuable objects taken since 2003. He also urged a global ban on Iraqi antiquities via a UN Security Council resolution. He said “Our antiquities are scattered everywhere from America to Europe. This problem is not new but it has intensified since 2oo3 and is now becoming a bigger problem.”

Speaking of America specifically, he argued “America is co-operating and not co-operating at the same time. We were grateful when they returned the Statue of Entemena (from 2,430BC) but at the same time, you see auctioneers all over the country trading in our antiquities. No action is being taken”. This statement, curiously, comes on the same day the Department of State published a notice of an import Restriction to Protect the Cultural Heritage of Iraq.

You can also hear his comments on BBC Radio 4’s Front Row program here, his interview starts at about 18 minutes in, which David Gill has noted this morning as well.

There at three separate issues here, first is what can be done to prevent looting in Iraq and how to regulate the illicit trade in Iraqi antiquities. Second, is the damage done by occupying forces to important sites at Babylon and elsewhere. Finally, there is the claim for restitution for objects which have long in the British Museum collection. The first two, it seems to me are related. The final question, which speaks to the notion of Universal Museums, must be separated. Every time this kind of discussion spins off into a discussion of the Parthenon Marbles and other restitutions, I think we lose site of the present ongoing issue: the looting of sites, and the illicit trade.

I am sympathetic to Dr. Mayar, as he must find it difficult dealing with a myriad of different agencies in Europe, and he feels the burden is on the source nation to give evidence of of an object’s illicit nature. Unfortunately this is the regime which the 1970 UNESCO Convention has produced, and efforts to create an effective multilateral agreement in this arena have been notoriously difficult. I think that must surely be tied to the disagreement and acrimonious nature the debates often engender.

Prof. Patty Gerstenblith has noted before that a lot of the reporting and discussion of the law as it pertains to the antiquities trade is wrong, and misses the point completely. I have to agree. Dr. Mayar talks about the incomplete response of the West to the trade in Iraqi antiquities, but I think the US and the UK have taken the necessary steps to attach criminal penalties to this trade. International law already bans the trade in Iraqi antiquities, under UN Security Council Resolution 1483:

Decides that all Member States shall take appropriate steps to facilitate the safe return to Iraqi institutions of Iraqi cultural property and other items of archaeological, historical, cultural, rare scientific, and religious importance illegally removed from the Iraq National Museum, the National Library, and other locations in Iraq since the adoption of resolution 661 (1990) of 6 August 1990, including by establishing a prohibition on trade in or transfer of such items and items with respect to which reasonable suspicion exists that they have been illegally removed, and calls upon the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization, Interpol, and other international organizations, as appropriate, to assist in the implementation of this paragraph;

In the United Kingdom, the Theft Act 1968, the Proceeds of Crime Act 2002, and the Iraq (UN Sanctions) Order 2003 creates a criminal offence for merely being in possession of Iraqi Antiquities.

The United States has banned the import of Iraqi antiquities, and the National Stolen Property Act, as well as the powerful Civil Forfeiture mechanisms available to Federal Prosecutors strongly regulate the criminal aspects of the trade.

The difficulty of course, and its one that Dr. Mayar speaks to, is the difficulty in establishing evidence of the fact that an object originated in Iraq, when it could have originated from any one of a number of countries. Are there Iraqi antiquities currently being sold in the United States and United Kingdom? I’ll confess I don’t know. His comments strongly indicate they are, but I’m unaware of such sales, or any reports indicating this is the case.

Ultimately, I think the US and the UK in particular have taken nearly all the steps they can to regulate the criminal aspects of the trade. To shift burdens any further would, without being overly dramatic here, require Constitutional-level reworking, to allow fewer rights for criminal defendants. That is a step no thinking person can responsibly advocate. That’s at the core of my arguments about the utility of the criminal response to the illicit trade. The solution, as I see it, is to introduce a way for cultural property transactions to require title history, provenance and findspot information for antiquities. This would give real effect to the law. Without such information, the antiquities trade will continue to evade effective regulation. Think about the California searches from earlier this year, despite a dramatic raid, we have yet to see any charges filed. Though this is heresy to even suggest for many in the archaeological community, this will in my view require compromise and will almost certainly require a liberalization of the trade in some respects.

Questions or Comments? Email me at derek.fincham@gmail.com

700 Antiquities Returned to Iraq


Syria returned 700 antiquities to Iraq on Wednesday, undoing in some small measure the theft and looting which has taken place since the invasion of Iraq in 2003. Here’s an excerpt of the AP story:

The head of the Syrian Antiquities Department, Bassam Jamous, said some of the objects were from the Bronze Age and early Islamic era.

The treasures were returned during a ceremony at the Syrian National Museum attended by senior Syrian officials and the Iraqi state minister for tourism and antiquities affairs, Mohammad Abbas al-Oraibi.

Jamous did not specify the value of the artifacts or single out the most important pieces, but clay jars, coins, daggers and what appeared to be a large trunk were displayed at the ceremony.

Syrian Culture Minister Riyadh Nassan Agha also said a “priceless Iraqi piece” of important historical value had been seized two weeks ago by Syrian customs officers. He gave no details, saying only that it would be returned to Iraq later after experts examined it.

AFP has a wire story as well, estimating that 32,000 objects were looted from 12,000 archaeological sites. Those numbers, though they are just estimates, speak for themselves. Given that Syria has returned 700 objects, this begs the question: how many more objects have been transported out of Iraq and have not been seized or recovered. I imagine many objects, especially the most valuable ones, are being hidden in anticipation of sales in the distant future, much as art seized or confiscated by the Nazis is still appearing.

As an indication of how serious the Iraq government considers those who are convicted of smuggling antiquities, despite overcrowding in Iraqi prisons, individuals detained for antiquities-related offenses were not released along with a number of other detainees under a law passed in February by the Iraqi government to ease prison populations. Many may remember that last month Marine Col. Matthew Bogdanos argued insurgents may be using the antiquities trade to fund their activities.

Questions or Comments? Email me at derek.fincham@gmail.com

Baghdad Museum: Five Years On

Without question the invasion of Iraq has produced tremendous theft from Museums, as well as illegal excavation. It has been five years since the Iraqi National Museum was ransacked. At the time, reports were too-quick to judge the damage, and many outlets reported that as many as 170,000 objects had been taken. As it turns out, present estimates indicate that perhaps 15,000 objects were taken, and of that number a still-disheartening half are missing. Plus, the museum itself still seems a long way from opening its doors.

Last week, at the National Press Club in Washington D.C. the University of Chicago’s Cultural Policy Center held a panel discussion, “Antiquities Under Siege,” to examine the ongoing situation in Iraq. The event is in conjunction with the publication of Antiquities Under Siege: Cultural Heritage Protection after the Iraq War, edited by Lawrence Rothfield. I haven’t yet had a chance to read this, but the work aims to look at went went wrong with the protection of Iraqi heritage, and what can be done better in the future. Also last week, there was an exhibition called “Catastrophe!” at the University of Chicago’s Oriental Institute Museum.

Setting aside the issue of whether the invasion was even an acceptable course of action, it seems to me a straightforward problem arose, which was entirely predictable. Looting of art and cultural sites is an inevitable outflow of armed conflict, and where the US and coalition forces did not have nearly enough troops to accomplish what they had intended, looting of all kinds occurred.

Below is a riveting interview with a couple of journalists, John Burns and Dexter Filkins of the New York Times. If you pick up the interview at just before the 40-minute mark, Filkins is describing the theft of Arabian horses on April 9, 2003 from the Iraqi Olympic headquarters right in front of American marines. There were only 7,000 troops policing an area where Saddam had had 250,000.

There’s another very interesting article in the Sunday Times by John Curtis of the British Museum who had conducted digs in Iraq in the past, and who flew to Baghdad on April 22 with reporters from the BBC:

Files, papers, index cards, photographs, films and computer software had all been swept off the shelves and onto the floor. It seemed that the intention had been to start bonfires, but fortunately this did not happen. All the safes in the building had been broken open. It was also clear that the intruders had broken into the storerooms, but at this stage nobody had been inside to assess the extent of the losses. There has been much speculation as to whether the looting that took place was spontaneous or organised – and who, precisely, was behind it. Theories have ranged from the involvement of Ba’athist loyalists, determined to cause maximum civilian unrest, to the connivance of international antique-dealers, requesting items to be stolen to order. Five years on, these questions remain unanswered. The whereabouts of looted material is also hotly disputed. There is clearly a black market in Iraqi antiquities, but where the pieces have ended up is not yet known.

The Baghdad museum suffered theft which has been well-documented, but a number of other sites have been damaged at the hands of coalition forces and looters, including the looting of a museum in Mosul, and the damage at Babylon. Coalition forces are finally now being educated and informed, but there is a continuous problem of widespread looting in more remote regions.

I think it is great that more attention is being paid to Iraqi Heritage at the 5-year anniversary. However this looting and theft will continue into the foreseeable future. Policing of sites is important, however that seems incredibly difficult given the security situation in the country. Perhaps we could continue to make sure the appropriate penalties are in place for buying and selling these objects as both the US and the UK have done; but the looting appears to be ongoing. Buyers all over the world seem inclined to buy these objects, and this demand will likely continue to make it profitable to steal objects and illegally excavate sites.

Questions or Comments? Email me at derek.fincham@gmail.com

Insurgents Selling Antiquities in Iraq

The AP is reporting on the views of Marine Colonel Matthew Bogdanos, a participant in this weeks conference in Athens. Bogdanos is a New York assistant DA, and was instrumental in the efforts by US forces to undo much of the damage and looting which occurred when the invasion began.

He argued it was “undeniable” that extremist groups were using antiquities smuggling to gain funds. As he said, “the Taliban are using opium to finance their activities in Afghanistan… Well, they don’t have opium in Iraq, what they have is an almost limitless supply of is antiquities. And so they’re using antiquities.” He even has heard from sources that Hezbollah is taxing antiquities.

The claim is open to speculation of course, because so much of the trade is hidden. However Bogdanos is a passionate and thoughtful advocate for the protection of Iraq’s national heritage, and as such the Pentagon and World leaders would be wise to listen. The more attention the looting problem in Iraq receives the better. Unfortunately, the US and Europe are doing very little to prevent this smuggling or to protect archaeological sites in Iraq.

Sadly, I think antiquities from this region will be appearing on the market for decades to come, and as such buyers, who should perhaps know better, will be confronted with the same embarrassing legal and ethical questions which have plagued North American institutions in recent years in their acquisitions of antiquities from Southern Italy. Of course they can avoid this controversy by refusing to purchase potentially tainted objects.

Questions or Comments? Email me at derek.fincham@gmail.com

Is culture a basic need?

Dheera Sujan, presenter of Earthbeat on Radio Netherlands has an interesting account of something called a Cultural Emergency Response, sponsored by the Prince Claus Fund. You can listen to the show here.

It’s an international aid organization which both attempts to rescue and preserve culture during times of conflict, when “culture is the first to go and often the last thing on anyone’s mind.” The organization aims to prevent acts of destruction such as the destruction of the Buddhas of Bamiyan, the Serb bombing the library of Sarajevo, and indeed the loss to Iraq’s heritage when the US the UK, and the other coalition countries invaded Iraq in 2003.

Aid organizations often don’t focus on cultural loss, they are tasked with other matters such as humanitarian and other assistance; the CER attempts to fill t;his gap. Els van der Plas, director of the Prince Claus Fund says “We feel that culture is a basic need and we think that rescuing culture can give people a sense of hope and direction.”

When a disaster or armed conflict occurs, an application can be submitted for up to 35,000 euros for a project, so long as it is completed within six months. The CER has sponsored a number of projects. In Nablus it helped stabilize the foundations of historic houses which were being damaged by the widening of roads used by the Israeli army; in Morocco, it funded the rebuilding of a mosque destroyed by an earthquake. In Afghanistan, it restored a synagogue in Heart which had been damaged by flood in conjunction with the Aga Khan Trust. As the radio piece argues, “the Jewish community is long gone from Afghanistan but the beauty of the building is undeniable. It’s also a beautiful metaphor for tolerance: a Western and a Muslim [organization] collaborating with primarily Muslim workers together to rebuild a Jewish synagogue in a Muslim country where the Jews are gone – so that their history may remain.”

These kinds of rebuilding efforts are symbolic and a powerful symbol. One wonders if the US and other coalition forces would have had a better result in Iraq and Afghanistan had they spent more time and effort on this kind of cultural aid, rather than what one Iraqi predicted for his nation after the invasion “Democracy! Whiskey! Sexy!“.

Questions or Comments? Email me at derek.fincham@gmail.com

Update on the Baghdad Museum

Martin Bailey has a very interesting interview with John Curtis, the Keeper of the Middle East at the British Museum on the current state of protection of archaeological sites in Iraq, now that we are approaching the five-year anniversary of the invasion, and the looting of the museum which soon followed. Here’s an excerpt:

TAN: How serious is looting of archaeological sites?

JC: The situation has been very bad, particularly in the south, at sites such as Isin, Tell Jokha (ancient Umma) and Bismaya (ancient Adab). However, recently there seems to have been an improvement. Professor Elizabeth Stone of Stony Brook University in New York State is monitoring satellite images of sites for evidence of digging. There now seems to be quite a falling off in the digging.

TAN: Why the improvement?

JC: Dr Abbas al-Hussainy, until recently the head of antiquities, had good contacts with tribal groups in the south and he stressed to them the importance of preserving sites. Another reason is that the market seems to have dried up, and there is no point in digging if you cannot realise quick profits. There may have been an improvement in policing of sites, but this is very recent, only in the past few months.

TAN: Are looted Iraqi antiquities turning up in western markets?

JC: There doesn’t seem to have been much Iraqi material appearing in London or western markets, and very little on eBay. There may be collectors buying in the Gulf states and the Far East, but this is speculation. Probably a lot of the looted material has remained in Iraq.

TAN: How much damage has been caused to sites by Coalition troops?

JC: Iraq is a vast archaeological site. You cannot have military manoeuvres without causing a great deal of damage.

I expect a number of new five-year what now retrospectives on the looting of the Baghdad museum, and the ongoing looting in Iraq. It seems to me that this issue is still under-reported, particularly by American journalists. What are American and Iraqi officials doing to safeguard sites? Sadly, I think they are doing very little, because the security situation in the country remains unstable.

Questions or Comments? Email me at derek.fincham@gmail.com

Did UN Troops Violate the 1954 Hague Convention?

I am just catching up on this story, but it strikes me as particularly troubling. 6,000 year-old paintings of animal and human figures have been spray-painted over by UN peacekeepers in the Western Sahara. The UN personnel with the Minurso mission in the Western Saraha signed and dated their work, and in some cases revealed their identities. As the Times reported back in January:

One Croatian peacekeeper scrawled “Petar CroArmy” across a rock face. Extensive traces of pigment from rock painting are visible underneath. Another left behind Cyrillic graffiti, and “Evgeny” from Russia scribbled AUI, the code for the Minurso base at Aguanit. “Mahmoud” from Egypt left his mark at Rekeiz Lemgasem, and “Ibrahim” wrote his name and number over a prehistoric painting of a giraffe. “Issa”, a Kenyan major who signed his name and wrote the date, had just completed a UN course, Ethics in Peacekeeping, documents show.

The Middle East Online reported that Morocco’s director of national heritage has accused the UN forces of graffiti on ancient sites, but also the theft of cave paintings, desecrating graves, and removing engraved paving stones.

Such disregard for important heritage of course implicates the 1954 Convention for the Protection of Cultural Property in the Event of Armed Conflict. To add to the difficulty, the head of the UN mission in Western Sahara (Minurso), seems to have bungled an apology, and served to incite more unrest between the groups he should be monitoring.

I’d really recommend those interested to have a look at what David Nishimura has to say on this, as I picked up the story from him. He notes the parallels with the coverage of the theft of objects from the Iraqi Museum, and the part coalition forces may have played in the looting of the museum in Baghdad. However he notes “the greatest damage in Iraq has been indirect, a consequence of civil disorder, rather than the direct result of military action. The vandalism in the Sahara is particularly shocking due to its deliberateness and the identity of those responsible, along with the complete lack of mitigating circumstances.”

I think that’s exactly right, and this story has received very little media attention in the West, particularly in the United States. There was a lot of legitimate outrage at the actions of the US military on the heels of the looting of the Baghdad Museum, however the actions of these UN forces deserves an equal measure of outrage in my view, and the troops responsible should be subjected to criminal penalties for looting and vandalizing these sites. Sadly, I think this reveals just how ineffective the international legal regime has been in protecting sites during armed conflict.

I know by monitoring the url logs that this site attracts some interest of journalists, notably when some of my ideas may prove useful for a story, which is great. However rather than writing the same story about Marion True for example, why not broaden coverage to encompass the full nature and extent of the antiquities problem?

Questions or Comments? Email me at derek.fincham@gmail.com

Rare Good News in Iraq


There appears to be some rare good news in Baghdad of late. There are indications that attacks in Iraq are way down. Also, John Swain of the Sunday Times reports today on the likely reopening of the Baghdad Museum next month, according to Amira Emiran the acting director.

Visits will be confined to just two galleries on the ground floor containing Assyrian and Islamic treasures that are too large and heavy to be easily removed. The remaining 16 galleries will remain empty and closed and security will be tight. Nevertheless, Iraqi and American officials are keen to portray the opening as a sign that security in Baghdad has improved after the chaos of the past few years…

The Assyrian Hall has monumental sculptures, including stone panels from the royal palace at Khorsabad and two winged bulls. The other large gallery that is opening, the Islamic Hall, has the eighth century mihrab from the Al-Mansur mosque in Baghdad. It is also hoped to display 10 monumental Parthian sculptures from Hatra in the courtyard which links the two galleries and through which visitors will pass.

The decision was welcomed by Matthew Bogdanos, a colonel in the US Marine Corps reserves, who investigated the theft and destruction of thousands of artefacts from the museum and from thousands of Iraq’s poorly protected historic sites where looting has been conducted “on an industrial scale” since the war.

Bogdanos, a New York prosecutor, said: “I don’t know if there is any such thing as a right or wrong moment to open the museum. But great things are won by great risk and the museum should open and it should stay open. If it means doubling security, then double security.”

Estimates of the number of missing objects vary, but about 10,000 objects are probably still missing, out of a total of 15,000 objects taken. One piece still missing is the ivory plaque pictured above, Lioness Attacking a Nubian, 8th c. BC. News of the reopening is welcome news, especially given it was seldom open to the public in the two decades preceding the invasion of Iraq in 2003. The announcement was made last week at the meeting of UNESCO’s International Coordination Committee for the Safeguarding of Iraqi Cultural heritage.

The news from Iraq is not all good however. The Bush administration is tempering its goals in Iraq, as military progress has been gained but the US will begin its major drawdown of troops following the “surge”, (i.e. escalation). US Officials are lowering their expectations, dropping plans for an oil-sharing plan and regional elections. The increase has yielded some important military successes, reflected in the decrease in attacks, but this military presence is not sustainable. One wonders if the decision to reopen the museum was made by Iraqi’s or if it was encouraged by their American counterparts. Even if it were the latter, the fact that Iraqis may now be able to view some objects safely is perhaps cause for cautious optimism.

Questions or Comments? Email me at derek.fincham@gmail.com

UCL and Incantation Bowls


I’m just catching up on this story, but I wanted to highlight an excellent article by Michael Balter in Science Magazine ($) on the decision by the University College London to suppress a committee report on the investigation into the provenance of a number of Incantation bowls, like this one. David Gill over at looting matters has more on this story as well.

The article and the report it describes both raise troublesome questions over whether researchers and Universities should conduct research using objects of questionable provenance. If they do, they risk lending credibility and provenance to objects which may have been illicitly excavated.

To give a bit of background, “During the 5th to 8th centuries C.E., many people living in Mesopotamia (present-day Iraq) buried pottery bowls under the thresholds of their houses to ward off evil demons. The bowls were inscribed with biblical passages and other incantations in Aramaic, an ancient Semitic language.”

Martin Schøyen owns the bowls and had temporarily donated them to UCL for study. Though the report has not been made public, Balter reveals the report “concludes that the bowls most likely left Iraq illegally sometime after August 1990, when Iraq invaded Kuwait.” Balter indicates the report is careful not to assign any wrongdoing to Schøyen, but does criticize UCL for agreeing to store these bowls without dutifully examining how they were acquired. The investigation concludes Schøyen has solid legal title to the objects, as he has possessed them for the 6-year limitations period under the law of England and Wales, his ethical title to them is far less certain. In the antiquities trade there remains a substantial gap between the state of the law and good ethical practice.

I find it troubling that UCL refuses to release the committee report, though their reticence is perhaps understandable. They are likely wary that the committee report may lead more criticism or potential claims. The reality remains that public laws for the protection of antiquities are not working. The best option a source nation has is often to pursue private claims or a public relations campaign. Both of those are expensive and time-consuming undertakings.

Colin Renfrew, a member of that inquiry, says in the Science article that, “It is shameful that a university should set up an independent inquiry and then connive with the collector whose antiquities are under scrutiny to suppress the report through the vehicle of an out-of-court settlement.”

What UCL should certainly do is make public efforts it will be taking to avoid lending credibility to other collections of potentially illicit antiquities. Because if they had erected such a safeguard prospectively, this dispute could have been avoided.

Questions or Comments? Email me at derek.fincham@gmail.com