Fate of Buddha statues still in the balance

Although some damage to Buddhist statues has been confirmed, UNESCO says that there is still a "faint hope" that the Taliban Islamic Movement might suspend their decision to destroy Afghanistan's "unIslamic" statues, including two giant Buddhas in Bamiyan province. Pierre Lafrance, a special envoy of the United Nations Scientific, Cultural and Educational Organisation (UNESCO) who has been dispatched to the region in a bid to save the country's pre-Islamic shrines and statues, told IRIN on Thursday that "smaller statues in the museums in Ghazni, Jalalabad and Herat have been very badly damaged". Nothing substantial had happened in terms of negotiations since his meeting with Taliban Foreign Minister Mullah Mutawakil in Kandahar, southern Afghanistan, last weekend, Lafrance said. However, he hoped to have further information on the Taliban position as holidays around the Islamic Eid al-Hajj drew to a close. "If some signs are given to me that I can really do something, then I will try to go back to Afghanistan over the coming weekend," he said. According to relief workers in Afghanistan, Taliban troops have fired rocket and tank rounds at the two giant Buddha statues in the Bamiyan valley, but there was no evidence yet of a systematic destruction. One aid worker familiar with the Central Highlands told IRIN that there had been "some minor damage" but no major destruction of the Buddhas. Because the 36- and 50-metre high Buddhas are carved out of sheer rock, firing tank or rocket shells would have little impact, according to local sources. Explosive charges would need to be used - as happened in 1999, when a local Taliban commander severely damaged the head of the smaller Buddha, they said. Although holes had been drilled into the smaller of the two great Buddhas for the placement of explosives, the commander was stopped short by instructions from the Taliban leadership in Kandahar, the sources added. The Taliban Information Minister, Jumal, announced last week that the destruction of the giant Buddhas had commenced. He said the head and leg of the taller Buddha had been destroyed as planned, in what appears to have been a deliberate "white lie" since experts familiar with the region confirm that the head and leg were damaged a long time ago. Some relief workers interpret this as a reluctance on the part of some Taliban officials to follow through with the eradication of Afghanistan's cultural heritage. The giant Buddhas of the Bamiyan Valley have been an Afghan symbol for centuries and appear on the plane tickets of the national Ariana Airlines, including those held by the 13,000 Afghan pilgrims performing devotional duties at the Islamic Hajj in Saudi Arabia this week. In the absence of any institutional means of countering a fatwa, or religious edict, Taliban officials may have no option but to implement the destruction of the statues, according to Afghan sources. Lafrance told IRIN it would be difficult to convince the Taliban leadership to shift its position, now that a fatwa had been issued. "It is very difficult to reverse a fatwa. It has been issued by the Taliban leader [Mullah Mohammad Omar] and the problem is to know how it will be implemented." "What I hope is that, on second thoughts, the Taliban might suspend implementation of the fatwa. That is the hope. But it's a faint hope," he said. The Taliban's plans to destroy Afghanistan's pre-Islamic heritage prompted criticism from the UN, Afghanistan's neighbours, religious, heritage and cultural bodies, and Afghan scholars. The Ukrainian President of the UN Security Council, Ambassador Volodymy Kuchynsky, on Tuesday condemned the destruction of non-Islamic icons as "incomprehensible and wanton acts of violence on the cultural heritage of Afghanistan". UNESCO has mobilised bilateral initiatives in an attempt to halt the intended destruction of the statues, including the intercession of Egyptian President Hosni Murabak.