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Nasser Nasser / AP
This file photo shows Seif al-Islam Gadhafi at a ceremony of the declaration of a sustainable environmental region at the ancient city of Cyrene near the city of al-Bayda, northeastern Libya Sept. 10, 2007.The site is one of five World Heritage Sites in the country.
Though reportedly safe for now, as the tension escalates in Libya, the fate of the country's archaeological heritage is increasingly uncertain, experts say. Meanwhile, in Egypt, threats to national treasures may resurface, after a pause.
The last of the foreign archaeologists working in Libya were evacuated Feb. 26, according to Nature News. The 11 archaeologists with the Italian-Libyan Archaeological Mission in the Acacus and Messak are studying ancient archaeology and rock art in the country.
Savino di Lernia, head of the team, relayed a message from Salah Agab, chairman of the Libyan Department of Antiquities, that currently the situation was under control and all museums and archaeological sites are safe.
But archaeologists fear the chaos and risk of looting poses a threat to the country's ancient archaeological sites, as they have in the recent uprisings in nearby countries such as Egypt.
Security is described as "good" at the Libya's five World Heritage sites, including the Roman ruins of Leptis Magna, a prominent coastal city of the Roman Empire about 80 miles east of Tripoli that is renowned for its public monuments, harbour, market-place, storehouses, shops and residential districts.
Other World Heritage sites include the ancient Greek archaeological sites of Cyrene; the Phoenician port of Sabratha; the rock-art sites of the Acacus Mountains in the Sahara Desert; and the old town of Ghadamès, an oasis city that has been home to Romans, Berbers and the Byzantine civilization.
The situation could be "problematic" elsewhere, di Lernia told Nature News.
The capital city, Tripoli, remains tightly controlled by Gadhafi's heavily armed forces, who this week launched counterattacks against nearby cities controlled by protesters. Despite the security presence, important sites in this northwestern region, such as Sabratha, are "really endangered."
A report from Reuters paints a similar picture of concern about the country's cultural heritage:
"So far there are no records whatsoever of any areas from the cultural heritage of Libya being affected by the troubles," said Hafed Walda, a Libyan who advises the country's department of antiquities and once led an excavation at Leptis Magna.
"We're always worried about this in terms of chaos. It's going in the right direction so far but I'm not sure it will carry on like this. I don't know," he said from his London base.
Meanwhile, Zahi Hawass, Egypt's antiquities chief who became a cabinet member this January, posted on his blog a list of some two dozen sites that were looted or vandalized since the uprising that led to the fall of Hosni Mubarak.
"Our antiquities are in grave danger from criminals trying to take advantage of the current situation," he writes.
Among the looted and vandalized sites were the storerooms for the Metropolitan Museum of Art's excavation site in Dahshur, south of Cairo, as well as the looting of the tomb of Impy near the Great Sphinx at Giza.
Hawass told the New York Times on Thursday that, for political reasons, he would not accept a post in the new Egyptian government to be formed by Essam Sharaf following the resignation of prime minister Ahmed Shafiq.
The depature of Hawass could lead to even more looting, Karl von Habsburg, president of Association of National Committees of the Blue Shield, a body that tries to protect cultural heritage in conflict zones, told the paper.
"I am terrified by the idea that [Zawass's departure] might be a sign to potential looters that now that last element of control is gone, and now we have a free hand to continue looting," he said.
John Roach is a contributing writer for msnbc.com. Connect with the Cosmic Log community by hitting the "like" button on the Cosmic Log Facebook page or following msnbc.com's science editor, Alan Boyle, on Twitter (@b0yle).
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Ho hummmmm Seems every times the world changes we lose more and more and gain little.
The best things in Libya are what the Roman occupation left behind millenia ago.
When you destroy history, you destroy the past, when you destroy the past, you destroy knowledge.
@ john pantal - It is not the Arab antiquities we are worried about. The beautiful abstract mosaics in the great Mosques are probably quite safe. Its the antiquities that weren't made by Arabs but happen to be in areas they control that are most at risk. History shows us that Islam is intolerant of other cultures, especially when it comes to representational art. Afghanistan and the destruction of the Buddhas is a good example. Art may be recovered from a looter, but a religious fanatic's destructive rampage is quite another story.
Amen!
you are so right...you know your history and subject matter f
Not true at all! If Muslims want to continue destroying their past, their culture and future, who are we to intervene? The Middle-East use to have the greatest philosophers, mathematicians, etc.; ever since the introduction of the Muslim philosophy, the entire region has been in decline. Only one Muslim has won a Nobel prize as proof.
We should be careful lest Facebook and Tweeter come's home to roost inside our own shores. Heaven knows we have more than a small amount of discontent people to make one heck of a demonstration, I wonder if we would like anyone telling us we should throw out our government and let the crowd take over?. Antiquities?. I got exactly 1 ounce of sand for sale soon to the highest bidder, opening bid's will be no less than $100.00. I am only waiting on the containers to ship it in. With 500 pounds of pure honest to goodness thousands of year old 'sand' everyone will have a opprtunity to purchase a small glass vial of the past dateing back thousands of years old. Everyone can shop in the safety of their own home and just wait on their peace of history. I intend on donating the money to myself and am hopeing I will reallize from my endeavor to finally reach the middle class here in America!. Other than that I think we should reallize that Mr. Mubrak was the longest and most continuing glue that held Egypt together since Cleopatra!. Perhaps we could induce him to pass a few hundred thousand AK47's to the Libyian people.
Are the "antiquities treasures" more important than humanity and humility?
Antiquities treasures are standing without breathing, without bleeding, without growing, without feeling, without crying pain, without losing loved ones, without feeling of suppression, without fighting of corruption, without voicing of democracy...
As the world turns, the falling of antiquities treasures is better than the falling of humanities and humilities.
Maybe, perhaps, the pro-Gadhafi regime and the pro-democratic groups need to move the fighting there, and it may remind the Gadhafi regime do not bomb and kill the pro-democratic groups.
And, perhaps, the antiquities treasures become the shield of democracy.
The Gadhafi regime has just kill thousand of people of Libya since the fighing of democracy, a peaceful unarmed democratic protests. Those people were living before the bomb and bullets dropping to their bodies.
Martin Luther King said it best when he spoke about living in a nation where people are not judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character. Your character Sir, speaks volumes.
Shimona
when ruines become more important than human life, we are doomed. You have no character, shimona.
Where did I suggest anywhere in that statement that human life was less valuable? You have no comprehension clearly about what I was talking. Therefore, I suggest to you that you comment elsewhere.
John Pantal Not only was your comment stupid but if you look at the museums in Egypt you will find gold,artifacts and many mummies. These people are not human corpses as you claim .they are a source of income for Egypt. As to your comment about US being hated only proves your hatred of people who can think and accomplish many great things. What is your contribution? People like you are the problem with planet Earth. And to reply to your insult about being full of it YES I am full of compassion,a sense of obligation to help people,a sense of right from wrong, a sense of human compassion, and a sense of moral values. And Yes this makes me a very proud American. What are you?
lets us not forget! the treasures,knowledge culture language and sacred places of OUR OWN INDIGENOUS peoples in the americas have come to the same fait.The best way to subjugate a people is to destroy there history and indoctrinate them into a culture that is not theres and after so many generations pass they will foregt from whom they came,just like the white washing of our indigenous peoples here(american indians)and the stripping of there cultures.
Yes, we should teach modern descendants of early Americans just how ignorant, brutal, and savage their ancestors were. They weren't anything like James Fenimore Cooper's Noble Savages. When Europeans came to the Americas, the Indians were still Stone Age people, many of whom practiced human sacrifice, all of whom practiced brutal warfare on each other.
Of course the Spanish Conquistadors were no prizes either. They brought the Inquisition and small pox with them, but few women. They preferred to rape the locals. The resulting half-breeds, who now call themselves "brown" people, are the ones invading our country by sneaking across our southern border. That is something we all can learn by studying the history of the Americas. The lesson to be learned is that uncontrolled immigration leads to disaster for the native born people of a nation.
Thank you Dr. Cat! Not all muslims are moronic. We have actually contributed to the world in a positive way as well such as algebra, the number zero to name a few. Laura, have you ever met people from the Middle East or ever travelled to the Middle East? I'm half Turkish and am very proud of it. Turkish people are the nicest people you could meet. They are rfiendly and will help you. Learn more of what people are and don't believe everything you read. Not everyone is bad just as not everyone is good.
As to destroying historical artifacts..........you are destroying valuable information, for without history we will repeat [ast mistakes.
"Turkish people are the nicest people you could meet."
Tell that to the Greek descendants of the former inhabitants of Constantinople, (now Istanbul), or any Armenian whose ancestors lost family members/friends during the Genocide of 1915-1916.
@john pantal
Want to bet it is Westerners and Egyptians working together that are trying to preserve Egypt's heritage? I would also bet there are Egyptians doing the looting. So quit trying to make it a us-them issue.
Was Timothy McVeigh a muslim? Don't classify terrorists.
booby, ooh, you got one exception to a RULE.
http://www.thereligionofpeace.com/index.html#Attacks
DateCountryCityKilledInjuredDescription
2011.03.04
Pakistan
Nowshera
10
37
Sunnis detonate a powerful bomb at a Sufi mosque during Friday prayers, taking down ten worshippers.
2011.03.03
Pakistan
Hangu
9
31
Women and children are among the casualties when a suicide car bomber detonates along a city street.
2011.03.03
Iraq
Haditha
8
10
A suicide bomber wades into a crowd at a bank and sends eight customers to Allah.
2011.03.02
Germany
Frankfurt
2
2
A gunmen yells 'Allah Akbar' and opens fire on unarmed US soldiers on a bus, killing two.
2011.03.02
Pakistan
Karachi
1
0
A seminary teacher is shot to death by sectarian rivals.
2011.03.02
Iraq
Ramadi
1
3
One victims bleeds out after a suicide bomber attacks a rival mosque.
2011.03.02
Pakistan
Islamabad
1
1
A Catholic cabinet minister is brutally shot to death in his car after being accused of blasphemy.
the terrorist attacks against of iraq and afghanistan are more than a 1000 terrorist attacks. hundreds of thousands dead, not to mention the destruction of infrastructure.
Antiquities at risk? Usually they are the ones destroying them.
Crap be upon them.
Probably the best thing they can do to those countries is to destroy all of their heritage. Since it is their so called heritage that is the problem. Destroy the whole country and start over with out religion.
"Love not the world, nor the things in the world." Man digs rocks out of the ground and builds things with them and then gets upset when someone knocks them down. There are plenty more rocks where they came from. Instead of "worshipping" someone else's things of the past, try building something NEW! And for those worried about forgetting the past, there are enough books with records and pictures of the things in the past, to last as long as anyone needs them.
As the hyper-generational Stockholm syndrome suffering Taliban did in Afghanistan (when they blew up their own heritage, the statues of Buddha at Bamiyan), the similarly suffering Islamist Arabs in the Middle East should busy themselves destroying all vestiges of their former cultures as soon as their Muslim Brotherhood holinesses take power. It’s the Islamic thing to do; destroying the idolatrous cultures of conquered and subjugated peoples is an Islamic tradition and a must if the Mohammadans are to properly worship their God – note that most mosques are built on the foundations of former temples or places of worship of conquered and slaughtered indigenous peoples.
But scientists shouldn’t fret; it’s a beautiful thing; they should rejoice as our Mohammadan neighbors work vigorously to make sure vestiges of their death-cult zakat collecting criminal enterprise culture will be the only artifacts left for some future extraterrestrial aliens to examine and use to try to decypher what the heck happened to all the people who used to live on this planet, a planet they will find devoid of human life once Allah has his way.
I could not be in a more clearer state of agreement and understanding than with you abdu, frankly I have often marveld and the positioning of the rug's?. Direction, time, space, are all thing's handed down by the ancients. Following that if we were to divide all by 1/4 and place them in opposeing position's five times a day would we have twenty five percent correct or seventy five percent correct. That would leave a vast majority either wrong or right. Isn't that what we have today.?. When one boils it all down then isn't it just a difference in direction?. Having come to reallize that is it a difference of physical orientation versus philisophical differences?. I never coud understand it. I guess it the name of peace and rest for tonight at least I will leave it up to you people to boil it out right. Human suffering due to hunger, violence, thirst are understandable; intolerance among the mass of the majority of the people due to a directional misunderstanding as to the placement of a rug just blow's my mind.
To SuprBrain - thanks so much for the link.
While on a visit to Israel, a terrorist stopped a car full of passengers – alas – the drive,
a pregnant mother and four little girls ranging between the ages of 5 and 1 year old.
The terrorist proceeded and in cold blood shot them at point blank and then drove off.
Did the world give a damn? NADA!!!
When Arabs from other countries get together---that is, if they ever do---they never agree on anything. It is part of their inherited culture to continuously be at odds with each other per Bible prophecy. So collectively, I seriously doubt they'd agree to settle their differences for the sake of their mutual economic interests. Just think people...if the nations of the Middle East stopped squabbling amongst themselves and openned up their borders to tourism...the sky would be the limit. But will such ever happen? No. And besides, what other world citizens would ever feel safe enough to dare go over to the likes of Iran, Iraq, Egypt, Palestine, Lebanon, etc. and spend their hard-earned cash on nations that harbor terrorists and make wild threats against the rest of the world. Seems like the major countries of Europe, Russia, France, England, Italy and so on---nobody is safe against the ignorance and stupidity of heartless terrorists. Oh well----so much for dreams huh?.....