Author:
Publication: BBC News
Date: March 2, 2001
The international community has
reacted with outrage to the news that Afghanistan's ruling Taleban movement
has begun destroying the country's statues. The United Nations Educational,
Scientific and Cultural Organisation, Unesco, denounced what it calls acts
of vandalism, and called on Muslim nations to try to put an end to the
destruction.
By perpetrating these acts of vandalism
the Taleban are furthering the cause neither of Afghanistan nor Islam
Unesco head Koichiro Matsuura But
the international outcry was dismissed and reports from Kabul describe
the hard-line Islamists using tanks and rocket launchers in their quest
to rid Afghanistan of the images which they consider blasphemous.
The statues under threat after the
order by Taleban supreme commander Mullah Mohammed Omar include two giant
Buddhas carved into the mountainside at Bamiyan which have religious, historic
and artistic significance.
It is not known whether these ancient
statues have already been attacked.
Islamic help
Unesco head Koichiro Matsuura, said:
"By perpetrating these acts of vandalism the Taleban are furthering the
cause neither of Afghanistan nor Islam."
The destruction of the statues has
prompted international concern
He urged other Islamic nations to
work together to find a solution, and said representatives from Saudi Arabia,
Pakistan, the United Arab Emirates and Iran had already backed his call.
"They have all expressed their unconditional
support and have pledged to do all that they can do to put a stop to these
destructions," said Mr Matsuura.
The French Foreign Ministry warned
the Taleban that the destruction of Afghanistan's cultural past would further
isolate it in the international community.
A Taleban spokesman in the United
States, Sayed Rahmatullah Hashmi, told the BBC the statues were being destroyed
to retaliate for the 1992 demolition of the ancient mosque at Ayodhya in
India by Hindu activists.
There has been no confirmation of
this from inside Afghanistan.
'Insulting statues'
"The implementation of Mullah Omar's
order to destroy statues began this morning," said Qadratullah Jamal, the
Taleban's information minister.
All we are breaking are stones
Taleban leader Mullah Mohammed Omar
"The destruction work began in Kabul, Jalalabad, Herat, Kandahar, Ghazni
and Bamiyan.
"The destruction work will be done
by any means available to them," he added.
Taleban leader Mullah Mohammed Omar
gave the order on Monday, declaring the statues were insulting to Islam
and should be destroyed.
The ultra-conservative Taleban believe
depiction of any human figure is blasphemous.
"All we are breaking are stones,"
Mullah Omar was quoted as saying by the Pakistan-based Afghan Islamic Press.
"According to Islam, I don't worry
about anything. My job is the implementation of Islamic order," he said.
Buddhas
Afghanistan was a Buddhist centre
before the arrival of Islam in the Ninth Century.
But some mullahs believe, mistakenly,
that Buddhists worship the Buddha and that the statues are therefore idols.
The country's museums contain numerous
Buddhas and other figures of priceless historical value.
Kabul museum contains priceless
Buddha statues
There are also a number of Hindu
shrines in Bakhtiar province.
"It is a great loss, a tragedy for
the Afghan people and for the world," said Italy's ambassador to Pakistan,
Angelo Gabriele de Ceglie.
Mr de Ceglie was in Kabul representing
an Italian-funded organisation dedicated to preserving what is left of
Afghanistan's rich past.
The head of one of the two Bamiyan
Buddhas was blown off during the Taleban's capture of the city in 1998.
The other statue, at 53 metres high,
is the world's tallest standing Buddha.
