The looting of Iraq continues apace

Now, I know in the grand scheme of things this may be considered petty - set against the thousands of dead and destroyed lives in that benighted country. But the continuing destruction and looting of the historical treasures of Iraq is a global tragedy, and it seems utterly irrelevant to the occupying powers.

I imagine that there's nothing they can realistically do about it. But it is unutterably sad. :shame:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Desecration of the cradle of civilisation

The looting and destruction of some of the world's most precious archaeological sites, first reported by this newspaper, have continued unabated despite a British pledge to protect them from armed gangs stealing to order for antiquities dealers

By Marie Woolf, Political Editor
Published: 15 April 2007

Looters using mechanical diggers and protected by their own private armies are destroying Iraq's ancient archeological sites - shattering priceless artefacts from the dawn of civilisation - despite a pledge by Britain to protect them.

Leading historians say the British Government has backtracked on a promise made four years ago to prevent 5,000-year-old cities such as Umma from being turned into "lunar landscapes" by thieves.

Satellite images show that archaeological sites equivalent in size to 3,000 football pitches have been dug up and plundered by teams of Iraqi looters bussed in by antiquities dealers.

"A country's past is disappearing while we stand and watch," said Professor Roger Matthews, chairman of the British School of Archaeology in Iraq. "Archaeological sites including entire ancient cities are being destroyed by illicit digging."

The television historian Michael Wood added: "What has happened is a catastrophe. Umma is one of the great sites. Some of their libraries include law and literature going back to 3000BC. But it has become a vast, pockmarked lunar landscape."

Four years ago Tessa Jowell, the Secretary of State for Culture, promised £15m to protect the ancient sites in what was Mesopotamia, historians claim. They argue the failure to guard the sites flouts the Hague Convention requiring cultural sites of occupied states to be protected. The Department of Culture now says this money was part of general reconstruction funds and no specific pledge to protect ancient sites was made.

Professor Elizabeth Stone, professor of anthropology at Stony Brook University, New York, has analysed satellite images of 2,000 sites in Iraq. She found looting over an area of six square miles - ranging from small areas to entire buried ancient cities.

"In the big sites there is organised looting where people are bussed by the antiquities dealers," she said. "Police who tried to sort out the looters at Umma were outgunned. The looters came with their own guards. The illegal antiquities trade is no different form the illegal drugs trade. There are major cities being totally destroyed."

Artefacts including ancient Babylonian seals and irreplaceable cuneiform tablets are disappearing before they can be examined by archaeologists. They are believed to be stored in warehouses and smuggled out of Iraq to America and European markets.

Fragments of tablets that may seem worthless are being discarded by treasure seekers who are unaware they are throwing away secrets to the shared heritage of east and west. One, found before the invasion, contained a third millennium BC version of the biblical flood myth. The city of Bad-Tibira has been wiped out and Isin, which was partially excavated in the early 1970s, has also been extensively plundered.

Professor Matthews added: "Since the fall of Saddam Hussein's regime the occupying powers in Iraq have signally failed to invest the funds and energies needed to protect the cultural heritage of Iraq which is ultimately under their guardianship."

Babylon was damaged during the occupation by American troops who landed helicopters on top of it. Uniquely among the ancient cities, it is now being guarded by Iraqis. Umma, a once splendid Sumerian city that was partially excavated before the invasion, has been practically destroyed by looters.

Mr Wood added: "Iraq is the cradle of civilisation and the place where civilisation arrived on earth. We are all indebted to Iraq and the early cities where writing was invented. But they have been devastated by illicit digging. The British Government had an obligation to the Iraqi people."

Before Saddam was deposed the sites were protected by guards and looting was punished by death. Now when Italian troops tried to stop looting at one site they were driven back by private soldiers.

When the Italians succeeded in seizing some looted artefacts the lorry containing them was hijacked and the drivers were found dead beside the empty lorry.

Ms Jowell's pledge to protect Iraqi heritage came after the much-publicised looting of Iraq's national museum. Archaeologists say the money never materialised. Last night the Department of Culture rolled back from the commitment and said it was up to Iraqis to protect their sites.

A spokesman said: "Tessa Jowell's announcement on 29 April 2003 about the £15m did not imply that this money was to be spent on culture but rather that it was a central pot earmarked by the Government for reconstruction efforts in Iraq which departments could bid for. In the event, no cultural projects were supported through this fund."

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Originally Posted by The Independent

Looters using mechanical diggers and protected by their own private armies are destroying Iraq's ancient archeological sites - shattering priceless artefacts from the dawn of civilisation - despite a pledge by Britain to protect them.

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They are just doing what al private contractors are doing in Iraq. It is called liberation.

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Last night the Department of Culture rolled back from the commitment and said it was up to Iraqis to protect their sites.

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That's a piece of crap. The sites are important for the entire world, not just Iraq. We're talking world history here, not just Iraqi history. As such, it is the responsibility of the world. If Iraq can't handle it alone, we have to help.

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Originally Posted by Article

... Artefacts including ancient Babylonian seals and irreplaceable cuneiform tablets are disappearing before they can be examined by archaeologists. They are believed to be stored in warehouses and smuggled out of Iraq to America and European markets...

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The first such artefact appearing in any American or European market, dealer, or auctioneer house, should get 25-year prison sentence on conviction of conspiracy to loot, PLUS 1 year (wait; 15 months) in Iraq on supervised guard duty over such sites.

In my opinion. :bow:

p.s. same in Afghanistan.

Cultures in the world create artifacts of such quality during golden ages. If they are not to be destroyed during dark ages they should be moved elsewhere.

Egypt fails miserably to look after the heritage that happens to be buried under its soil, and again these are treasures for the world.

Far better that the artifacts to into other countries for safekeeping than stay in Iraq and get destroyed.

~:smoking:

I see your point, rory_20_uk, but ownership of the stuff "under its spoil" has to remain vested in its inhabitants, lest that theory ('not being properly safeguarded/exploited' for the greater good) extend to the other stuff - like oil, minerals, water, etc.

But how do the current inhabitants have any more right to archeological finds than anyone else? The current states weren't in existence when such items and sites were created; the Greeks of the fifth century BC have no more a direct connection with the Greeks of now than any other nation. Such relics are world heritages and should be treated as such.

The artifacts are on the country's land so technically it is that of the country's I guess

Well, sure. But if that country doesn't (or can't) take responsible care of such heritage sites, should they be allowed such a role?

I think the military has a more important duty: trying to save as many lives as possible. It's the 21th century, anything remotely interesting there should have been investigated already and photographs or duplicates should exist. I'm all for history, but are we going to value a piece of 2000year old pottery above a human life ?

And so in cases such as the Taliban in Afghanistan (or the Communists in China) go on a rampage destroying items hundreds or thousands of years old do we just shrug our collective shoulders?

Lives are ten a penny. If we cared about lives we'd all donate to Oxfam as they save far more lives per buck.

I agree that every 1,000 year old cup isn't worth it, but many are.

~:smoking:

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Originally Posted by rory_20_uk

I agree that every 1,000 year old cup isn't worth it, but many are.

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Some historic evidence can be worth more than a life, perhaps, but like I said, archeologists have had plenty of time took around already, I'd assume anything important is already well documented enough. Other than information, historical pieces only hold sentimental value, and I won't easily value that over a life.

EDIT: I hardly see the value in a cup though, unless it has drawings on it perhaps, or contains remainders of food, a cup by itself is pretty worthless. Pottery barn will happily supply you with as many as you'd ever need.
The Buddha statues in Afghanistan were a different matter alltogether, first of all because it wasn't an if situation, there would have been nothing lost if they still stood, and second of all because they were a 'wonder' a rare (in scope) and unique achievement of ancient human civilization. Not quite a cup.

How much do you value a life?

Oh, I know how precious they are, and how of course we'd do nothing to end one...

In the UK, NICE values lives at £30,000 per year.

But funnily enough most people do close to nothing to stop deaths in the world, except say how terrible it is. ~:mecry:

Luckily many people are prepared to cherish treasures for future generations. I'd rather private collectors had them than no one at all.

~:smoking:

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Originally Posted by rory_20_uk

How much do you value a life?

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Certainly a difficult question, it depends on what position you are taking, and who's life it is of course, but either you accept a life has an intrisic value or you don't, in the latter case it can still have an economic value of course, but then you're just looking at things from a utilitarian perspective.

In the end money only has value in as far as it can be used by humans to provide in their needs, amongst them the need for (personal) survival, so perhaps expressing things in terms of money is rather abstracting the problem to an unnecessary level for sake of comparison.

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Oh, I know how precious they are, and how of course we'd do nothing to end one...

In the UK, NICE values lives at £30,000 per year.

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What's NICE ? Seems like a reasonable figure to me, in line with most other economic estimates of the value of life I've seen. But like a said, economic value is just *a* means for comparison, it can be quite necessary to have a figure when making a budget for healthcare, but just because there's number doesn't mean it's the right number.

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But funnily enough most people do close to nothing to stop deaths in the world, except say how terrible it is. ~:mecry:

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Does the fact that many people do something make it right ?

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Luckily many people are prepared to cherish treasures for future generations. I'd rather private collectors had them than no one at all.

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I never disagreed on that point. I just stated that wasting soldiers on protecting a bunch of old pottery when real, living people need protection is rather twisted.

Apologies, NICE is the National Institute for Clinical Excellence. It assesses the value of new treatments.

A "person" as an undefined object has little more than a utilitarian "value" to me. So of course my family has far more value than this, but I understand that few others would bias their worth in this way.

I would agree that using soldiers to protect antiques is not what they are for. So get the antiques out of the country! Since we are protecting the precious people, they can give us the pottery in return, and they even have the chance to appreciate it or its copies in future - something that is not possible if its full of bullet holes.

~:smoking:

Before you all start talking about ancient pottery being worth so and so many lifes, what amount of pottery would be needed for you to give YOUR lifes?
Would you like to lose your life just so that some professor at a university has something nice to show his students? In what way do ancient findings help us get a better future? It's all nice and interesting to know what life back then was like, but in what way does it help us today?
I seriously wouldn't want to get shot for a bunch of old pottery.:thumbsdown:

In Archaeological excavations the method of extraction is key. Every find needs to be logged in its exact place, and carefully checked to see what it was or might have been, to find out its overall place in the scheme of things.

As the article mentions its likely that much more 'knowledge' is being destroyed than is being recovered, and what is being recovered when sold to collectors in an 'out of context' situation then it loses much of its value to educate us about these ancient cities of which not very much is known.

The value of whats being lost is certainly worth more a few pottery cups, but not worth dying for, but then the Government seems to think that a lot of things are worth risking soldiers lives for that I wouldn't have thought were worth dying for. I guess these ancient sites and whatever they might have been able to tell us about the ancient mesopotamian civilisations will just have to be written off as another casualty of war.

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Originally Posted by Husar

Before you all start talking about ancient pottery being worth so and so many lifes, what amount of pottery would be needed for you to give YOUR lifes?

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Why do you hate Indiana Jones?

beginning of civilization, who woulda guessed it would be the beggining of the end of it.

Currently the choice is: items out of context or rubble.

Any argument that places oneself as one option is pointless. People value themselves far higher than most things.

~:smoking:

Looting is part of the spoils of every war. This war is no different. With all the facade of civillisation and ethical ideology, the warring factions are no different than any other in history.

Something should be done about it, but I'm sure with Iraq Total Chaos going on the coalition has got their hands full. So there is a valid excuse !!! (joke)

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Originally Posted by rory_20_uk

Any argument that places oneself as one option is pointless. People value themselves far higher than most things.

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And maybe they're right.~;)

If the world allows the argument: "I am an educated and respected archeologist from Europe, so I will take these objects so that they don't get broken."

How is that different from: "I am an educated and respected oilman from Texas, so I will take this oil so that it isn't wasted." ?

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Originally Posted by KukriKhan

If the world allows the argument: "I am an educated and respected archeologist from Europe, so I will take these objects so that they don't get broken."

How is that different from: "I am an educated and respected oilman from Texas, so I will take this oil so that it isn't wasted." ?

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I guess because the esteemed Texan is unlikely to conserve the removed oil in an accessible museum, researched and available to all visitors for generations to come and with the possibility of repatriating the oil when the donor country settles down.*

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

* Or not, Lord Elgin. :stupido2:

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In Archaeological excavations the method of extraction is key.

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Well bugger me sideways and call me shirley , The Gibbon has a point , a rather relevant point , in fact it might be described as the most relevant point that a relevant pointy person (on a particularly good pointy day) could possiblly come up with .

Point taken. But what is indisputeable is that the resource(s) "under the soil" belong to the inhabitants, and they ought not be taken, whether for the alleged good of mankind overall, or the enrichment of the taker, without the inhabitants' consent.

As Sinan points out above, a conqueror may be able to lay claim to war-booty - but are we conquerors?

So better destroyed by the locals than taken and looked after elsewhere? :inquisitive:

~:smoking:

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Originally Posted by Lemur

Why do you hate Indiana Jones?

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My first thought reading this thread was that we have the makings of a new Indiana Jones movie on our hands here.

Ajax

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Originally Posted by rory_20_uk

So better destroyed by the locals than taken and looked after elsewhere?

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A lot of stuff is being destroyed by the guys that take it away. Not really much different than excavating Egyptian tombs with dynamite, then selling off any surviving loot.

All the more reason for a concerted effort to remove the artifacts by an international team then.