Hope for Buddhas as Taliban send mixed messages

(AFP)

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KABUL (March 4, 2001): A hint of hope emerged on Saturday that Afghanistan's priceless Buddhist heritage could be saved even as Taliban officials insisted nothing could stop their "Islamic" mission to destroy ancient statues.

Disregarding a wave of international protest, Minister of Information and Culture Mawlawi Qudratullah Jamal said two thirds of the statues had been smashed and "work" was continuing on the two famous Buddha figures in central Bamiyan province.

"The process is being carried out both by gunpowder and spades and hammers. Work is underway for the destruction of the all the Bamiyan statues," he said, adding that it would be complete within four days.

Already an international pariah recognised by only three countries, the puritanical Islamic militia have been condemned by governments and religious leaders around the world for their move to destroy so-called "false idols."

They have also been flooded with desperate ideas to save the ancient relics, including the Bamiyan Buddhas built between the second and fifth centuries AD.

"It is not a big issue. The statues are objects only made of mud or stone," Jamal said, stressing that he had received no update on how much of the world's tallest standing Buddha at Bamiyan had been reduced to rubble.

"They will be totally destroyed. It is easier to destroy than to build. The order has been given to destroy them altogether including their hands, heads and legs."

He qualified earlier claims from Taliban officials that the statues, carved into a massive sandstone cliff, were being attacked with tanks and rockets.

"They do not (need) much rockets and tank shells. They are being destroyed with the use of some gunpowder," the minister said.

Taliban leader Mulla Mohammad Omar on Monday issued what officials said was a decree ordering the total annihilation of Afghanistan's statues to stop idolatry.

Special representative of the UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) Pierre Lafrance, who was dispatched on an emergency mission from Europe on Friday, said he saw a "faint glimpse of hope" after a meeting with the Taliban ambassador in Pakistan.

Lafrance, a former French ambassador to Iran and Pakistan, said "my interlocutors this morning told me the destruction has not started and no real order for this destruction had been delivered."

"We are not sure that a real decree has been issued. Many people (Afghan and Pakistani officials) say it was not a decree, it was just a statement - at least they wonder. There's a faint glimpse of hope," he said.

On Sunday he was expected to leave for the southern Taliban stronghold of Kandahar for talks with Omar, but he said so far only Foreign Minister Wakil Ahmed Mutawakel was available.

Jamal said that apart from three countries - Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, which have recognized the religious militia - the world had no right to complain about the destruction.

"The implementation of the decree will not be delayed because of this (international uproar)," he said, adding that the world community "was not kind" to the Afghan people before.

Pakistan has issued two protests and UNESCO's Arab Group, comprising all 22 members of the Arab League including Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, has described the move as "savage."

"The Arab Group of UNESCO condemns these savage acts and notes that successive Islamic governments in Afghanistan have preserved these masterpieces for 14 centuries," it said on Friday.

UN Secretary General Kofi Annan asked the Taliban to accept an offer by New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art to house statues destined for destruction.

Council of Europe Secretary General Walter Schwimmer denounced the destruction, saying: "No political or religious power has the right to deliberately destroy cultural property that belongs to humankind."

 

Special UNESCO envoy sees hope

ISLAMABAD: UNESCO special envoy Pierre Lafrance said he saw a "glimpse of hope" that Afghanistan's cultural heritage could be saved after a meeting with the Taliban ambassador here on Saturday.

Lafrance, who arrived overnight, told Ambassador Abdul Salam Zaeef of the world's strong opposition to the Islamic militia's destruction of ancient statues throughout the country.

The fundamentalist Islamic militia said on Thursday it had begun destroying the statues - including two huge Buddhas dated to between the second and fifth centuries AD - to prevent idolatry in line with an Islamic decree.

Cries of condemnation have come from across the globe but so far the Taliban, recognised by only three countries, have not backed down. Officials in Kabul on Saturday said 60 per cent of the statues had already been smashed.

But Lafrance, a former French ambassador to Iran and Pakistan, said "my interlocutors this morning told me the destruction has not started and no real order for this destruction had been delivered."

"We are not sure that a real decree has been issued. Many people (Afghan and Pakistani officials) say it was not a decree, it was just a statement - at least they wonder. There's a faint glimpse of hope," he said.

On Sunday he was expected to leave for the southern Afghan city of Kandahar for talks with Taliban supreme leader Mulla Mohammad Omar, but he said so far only Foreign Minister Wakil Ahmed Mutawakel was available.

"We have told him this is an Islamic decree, that is why we have given orders for the destruction of the staues," Ambassador Zaeef was quoted as saying earlier by the Afghan Islamic Press.

Lafrance said "it is quite possible" that local commanders had fired tank shells and rockets at the Bamiyan Buddhas, as Taliban officials said Friday, but it could not be confirmed.

He said he would ask permission to visit Bamiyan and the Kabul Museum.

Remembering his last trip to see the Bamiyan Buddhas, which are carved into the side of a sandstone mountain, he said: "They are stately, serene, impressive, and despite the fact that they are made of stone, they are immaterial."

"If some people think that they can make a blow to the West by attacking the remnants of Buddhist heritage they are totally wrong," he said.

"It's not to the West that they will give this blow, but to the whole of mankind."

Lafrance said he also hoped to visit Jeddah in Saudi Arabia on his way back from Afghanistan and meet Abdelouahed Belkeziz, the secretary general of the Organisation of the Islamic Conference.

"Words fail me to describe adequately my feelings of consternation and powerlessness as I see the reports of the irreversible damage that is being done to Afghanistan's exceptional cultural heritage," Matsuura said on Friday.

He said he had brought together the ambassadors of the 54 countries of the Organisation of the Islamic Conference to discuss ways to end the destruction.

"They were all united in vigorously condemning these unacceptable attacks on humanity's common heritage," he said.