Contact & About HOME ALL POSTS CULTURE PLUNDER OF CULTURAL HERITAGE WAR... Plunder of cultural heritage war crime': UNESCO director at Cairo conf

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2 Page 1 of 8 Contact & About FOLLOW US: Search HOME ALL POSTS CULTURE PLUNDER OF CULTURAL HERITAGE WAR... Plunder of cultural heritage war crime': UNESCO director at Cairo conf May. 13, :40 Culture Under Threat Conference - YOUM7/Kareem Abdul Azeez By Rany Mostafa CAIRO: The plunder of cultural heritage must be condemned as a war crime, UNESCO Director-General Irina Bokova said in her inaugural speech at an international conference to combat the sale of antiquities by extremist groups in Middle East countries that kicked off in Cairo Wednesday. Under the slogan Culture under threat: the security, economic and cultural impact of antiquities theft in the Middle East, the conference aims to promote ways to address threats against cultural heritage in regional countries of political turmoil and armed conflicts, along with finding solutions to the increasing destruction, looting, and trafficking of antiquities.

3 Page 2 of 8 Cultural heritage reflects the life of the community, its history and its identity. Its preservation helps to rebuild broken communities, reestablish their identities, and link their past with their present and future, said Bokova. Under the auspices of UNESCO, the 2-day conference is jointly organized by the Antiquities Coalition Organization and the Egyptian Ministries of Antiquities and Foreign Affairs. High profile and ministerial delegations from a number of countries from within the Middle East alongside presidents of international NGOs were present during the opening ceremony. The conference also focused on the links between cultural heritage racketeering and terrorist financing. UNESCO Director General Irina Bokova and Egyptian Antiquities Minister Mamdouh al-damaty The global trade in looted artifacts is fueled by extremist groups. In addition to plundering the cultural heritage of countries in strife, the money made by selling ancient treasures on the black market often helps to fund groups like the Islamic State, said chairwoman and cofounder of the Antiquities Coalition Deborah Lehr.

4 Page 3 of 8 The gruesome videos of the destruction of the ancient Assyrian city of Nimrud and priceless artifacts at the Mosul s central museum by the Islamic State (IS) group in Iraq and Syria have renewed calls for drastic action to save Iraqi and Syrian antiquities before they are lost forever, President of the Washington-based Middle East Institute Wendy Chamberlin said. From 2011 to 2013, declared imports of antiquities from five Middle Eastern countries rose by 86 percent, and legal imports to the U.S. from Iraq alone rose over 1,000 percent, according to Chamberlin. In December, UNESCO called on the United Nations to curb multibillion dollar artifact trafficking from Syria and Iraq. The Syrian authorities have reclaimed over 6,200 artifacts looted by militant groups and smuggled out of the country during the past four year, head of Syria s General Directorate of Antiquities and Museums Ahmad Deeb told The Cairo Post.

5 Page 4 of 8 As for Egypt, reports of ancient Egyptian artifacts being smuggled out of the country have been common since the 2011 uprising that toppled former President Hosni Mubarak. The Egyptian Museum in Cairo and the Mallawy Museum in Minya were looted during and after the January 25 Revolution while the Museum of Islamic Art, home to almost 100,000 priceless artifacts, was extensively damaged in January 2014 when a car bomb exploded outside Cairo security directorate headquarters across the street. Egypt had signed agreements of bilateral understanding with a number of countries including the U.S. to impose restrictions on the importing and exporting of antiquities, Antiquities Minister Mamdouh el Damaty said. During the past four years, Egyptian authorities were able to retrieve over 12,000 artifacts some of which had been put up for sale on international auction houses, according to Damaty. Like ancient Antiquities artifacts Assyrian auction cairo Cairo news culture egypt heritage Iraq Irina Bokova IS loot Mosul museum Nimrud plundering racketeering strife Syria terrorism terrorist Threat UNESCO Youm7 Leave A Comment

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