Iraqi experts trained to save Mosul heritage

LONDON - AFP

As Iraqi forces fight to take back Mosul from the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), archaeologists trained by the British Museum are preparing for another battle; trying to save what they can of the city’s heritage.

One of the world’s leading institutions for the study of ancient Iraq, the London museum has been training Iraqi experts for the past year in high-tech methods to preserve and document their history.

“Once the city is liberated, there will be an enormous plan of reconstruction of the Museum of Mosul,” said Sebastien Rey from the Iraq Emergency Heritage Management Training Scheme.

“One of the participants of our scheme will be the first archaeologist to enter the museum and do an assessment of the destruction inside,” said Rey, a lead archaeologist.

The scheme is designed to “get people ready for the day” archaeological sites are taken back from ISIL control, said its director, Jonathan Tubb.

“We felt that we wanted to do something positive and constructive in the face of the most appalling destruction that had been going on,” he said.

ISIL militants in Iraq, Syria and Mali have targeted priceless cultural heritage sites after denouncing them as un-Islamic.

The Mosul area, home to several archaeological sites including the ancient cities of Nineveh and Nimrud, is of particular importance.

In April 2015, ISIL released a video of its fighters destroying monuments in Nimrud before planting explosives around a site and blowing it up.

They also attacked Hatra, a Roman-era site, in the northern Nineveh province. The Iraqi army launched a massive operation in October 2016 to retake Mosul, Iraq’s second largest city and ISIL’s last major stronghold in the country.

After retaking the city’s eastern flank, Iraqi special forces are now fighting their way through the west in an offensive that began on Feb. 19.

Launched in January 2016, the six-month training scheme sees Iraqi archaeologists spend three months in London and three months in Iraq.

It includes training in the use of satellite imagery and digital mapping, as well as tools for recording buildings and monuments. They then get to practice their new skills in secure sites across their home country.

A graduate of the scheme, which aims to train 50 archaeologists over a five-year period, is now leading the assessment in Nimrud. “They went in a couple of weeks after the city was liberated,” Rey said.

“The training is very useful and beneficial for us and we can use the tools that we get here,” Halkawt Qadir Omer, a current trainee from Arbil, said.  

Known as the cradle of civilization, Iraq is still full of undiscovered treasures.
So for Omer, the scheme offers much more than simple tools. “Now, we have contact with the British Museum to complete our projects, to discover and to change the direction of history and archaeology,” he said.