Category Archives: Artworks – Looting

Isis Profits from Destruction of Antiquities by Selling Relics to Dealers

03 Thursday Sep 2015

Posted by in Artworks - Looting, Heritage Sites - Syria - Destruction

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Isis profits from antiquities

So why is Isis blowing to pieces the greatest artefacts of ancient history in Syria and Iraq? The archeologist Joanne Farchakh has a unique answer to a unique crime. First, Isis sells the statues, stone faces and frescoes that international dealers demand. It takes the money, hands over the relics – and blows up the temples and buildings they come from to conceal the evidence of what has been looted. “Antiquities from Palmyra are already on sale in London,” the Lebanese-French archaeologist Ms Farchakh says. “There are Syrian and Iraqi objects taken by Isis that are already in Europe.

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Stealing from History: The Looting and Destruction of Iraqi and Syrian Heritage Concern Us All

11 Thursday Dec 2014

Posted by in Artworks - Looting, Heritage Sites - Iraq - Destruction, Heritage Sites - Syria - Destruction

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Stealing from History

In September, the US secretary of state John Kerry told an audience gathered at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York about another disaster facing Syria, a country already gripped by catastrophic civil war. In no uncertain terms, he warned of the scourge of the looting of archaeological sites, labelling ISIL the worst offender. “The looting of Apamea and Dura-­Europos, the devastation caused by fighting in the ancient Unesco heritage city of Aleppo, the destruction of the Tomb of Jonah – these appalling acts aren’t just a tragedy for the Syrian and the Iraqi people,” Kerry said. “These acts of vandalism are a tragedy for all civilised people, and the civilised world must take a stand.”

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Conflict and Cultural Heritage in Syria

03 Thursday Oct 2013

Posted by in Artworks - Looting, Heritage Sites - Syria - Destruction

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On September 25, at an event at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City, the International Council of Museums (ICOM) announced the Emergency Red List of Syrian Cultural Objects to fight against illicit traffic in cultural goods. World Monuments Fund President Bonnie Burnham was one of the speakers at the event, and below is an edited version of her remarks.

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See also: Emergency Red List of Syrian Cultural Objects at Risk

Who’s Stealing Afghanistan’s Cultural Treasures?

24 Tuesday Sep 2013

Posted by in Artworks - Looting, Heritage Sites - Afghanistan

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Looting Afghanistan's cultural treasures

The battered white Corolla rumbles down a rocky road past fields of okra and great earthen mounds topped by the crumbling remains of ancient battlements. Taking a hard right and then a hard left, the old car bounces up onto a small dirt soccer field and jerks to a stop. “All of this is the tepe,” says Abdul Wahid, a neatly dressed farmer in his 40s, pointing at a dirt expanse so pitted it looks like it has been carpet-bombed. He gets out of the car and walks over crumbling humps of dirt, skirting pits left by looters.

Read More: Who’s Stealing Afghanistan’s Cultural Treasures?