- Title: In Mosul, experts piece together artefacts damaged by Islamic State
- Date: 27th March 2023
- Summary: MOSUL, IRAQ (MARCH 11, 2023) (REUTERS) FRAGMENTS OF ARTEFACTS ON DISPLAY IN MUSEUM STORAGE VARIOUS OF TEAM INSPECTING FRAGMENTS TEAM MEMBER WEARING HEADLIGHT LOOKING ON GLOVED HANDS MANIPULATING FRAGMENT (SOUNDBITE) (Arabic) DIRECTOR OF THE MOSUL MUSEUM, ZAID GHAZI SAADALLAH, SAYING: "These pieces were collected through archiving processes, by reviewing real photos of the artefacts and with the great ideas of the restoration team as well as through the intensive training they obtained from the French." VARIOUS OF RESTORATION TEAM MEMBERS PREPARING DRILLING EQUIPMENT OVERVIEW OF WORKING SPACE VARIOUS OF STORED ARTEFACT (SOUNDBITE) (French) FRENCH RESTORATION EXPERT, DANIEL IBLED, SAYING: "And now we are starting to work on the most gratifying part. We are starting to assemble and glue the pieces, gradually reconstituting the works, until the total reconstitution of the work at the end, except for the parts that are missing because they have been crushed or disappeared." VARIOUS OF IBLED AND TEAM DRILLING INTO A HANGING PIECE OF ARTEFACT (SOUNDBITE) (Arabic) DIRECTOR OF THE MOSUL MUSEUM, ZAID GHAZI SAADALLAH, SAYING: "The restoration of these pieces (is done) is an exemplary way, according to international standards and in accordance with the applicable methods in the science of restoration. To recreate the artefacts like they were before, without any scratch, is impossible. Impacts are there, but these impacts would be telling the story of the destruction and the awful crimes that the Islamic State committed against cultural heritage." TEAM MEMBER AT WORK IN MUSEUM HOLE IN THE GROUND OVERVIEW OF STORAGE ROOM IN MUSEUM (SOUNDBITE) (French) FRENCH RESTORATION EXPERT, DANIEL IBLED, SAYING: "The idea is to make them - I will not say 'better than before' - but we will use this opportunity to retouch all the old restorations that did not age well, we will clean them, do a lot of things that will turn them into something else, but something I hope will be easier to read for the people who will visit them later. But the chapter of Islamic State will necessarily leave its marks on history." VARIOUS OF TEAM MEMBER AT WORK
- Embargoed: 10th April 2023 13:30
- Keywords: Assyrian antiquities Heritage Iraq Mosul Museum Restoration
- Location: MOSUL AND SAID TO BE MOSUL, IRAQ
- City: MOSUL AND SAID TO BE MOSUL, IRAQ
- Country: Iraq
- Topics: Arts/Culture/Entertainment,Middle East
- Reuters ID: LVA003036926032023RP1
- Aspect Ratio: 16:9
- Story Text: One fragment at a time, a French and Iraqi restoration team is trying to piece together antiquities smashed to pieces by Islamic State militants when they looted and ransacked Mosul's museum.
In a video released early 2015, the militants had filmed themselves smashing with sledgehammers some of the building’s contents including priceless statues, as part of their highly publicized campaign to erase any cultural history that contravenes their extreme interpretation of Sunni Islam.
Reuters cannot independently verify the content of the video that was published on social media websites.
Since 2019, a team of French restoration experts support local efforts to give a new life to Assyrian pieces of over 2,700 years, which fragments were found in the museum after the city's liberation in 2017.
According to restoration expert Daniel Ibled, the biggest challenge the team faced was the sheer amount of fragments that needed to be sorted at the onset of their mission.
"Now we are starting to work on the most gratifying part. We are starting to assemble and glue the pieces, gradually reconstituting the works," Ibled said, standing in the space where the project's staff patiently organised tiny fragments or worked on labeling those pieces that found their place in the puzzle.
"To recreate the artefacts like they were before, without any scratch, is impossible," said the director of Mosul's museum Zaid Ghazi Saadallah. But the marks left by the brutal onslaught on Iraq's ancient treasures is a testimony to "the awful crimes that the Islamic State committed against cultural heritage," he thought.
The project receives funding from the International Alliance for the Protection of Cultural Heritage in Conflict Areas (ALIPH). International partners of the project are the French Louvre museum, the Washington's Smithsonian Institution and the World Monuments Fund.
According to Saadallah, many of the museum's antiquities remain at large until today, a testimony to the theft by Islamic State who used them as a source of income.
(Production: Kawa Omar, Maher Nazeh, Charlotte Bruneau) - Copyright Holder: REUTERS
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