World decries Taleban plan to raze age-old Buddhas

ON THE NEWS Nic Robertson: Buddhas' fate signals Taleban divisions

NEW DELHI, India (CNN) -- Afghanistan's Islamic Taleban regime, ignoring world outcry, may have already started to demolish two ancient statues of Buddha, opposition leaders said Friday.

There was no independent confirmation that the destruction of the two Buddhas, in obedience of an edict to demolish all non-Islamic relics, had begun.

"I have received numerous reports from Afghanistan throughout the day about the starting of Taleban demolishing the statues," said Abdullah Abdullah, a New Delhi-based spokesman for the anti-Taleban Northern Allegiance of Afghanistan. "But I cannot say categorically that they already demolished it or not."

The sandstone Buddhas of Bamiyan are believed to have been built in the 3rd century. The statues -- one of which stands at 38 meters (125 feet), the other 53 meters (174 feet) -- are among the world's tallest Buddhas and are widely recognized as incorporating diverse European and Asian artistic styles.

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Afghanistan's fundamentalist Taleban says the statues violate Islamic laws forbidding depiction of the human form. Afghan troops have been demolishing statues in the Kabul Museum and in the provinces under Taleban control after a Monday edict by Mullah Mohammed Omar, the movement's leader.

The Taleban want to remove any reminders of the centuries before Islam, when Afghanistan was a center of Buddhist learning and pilgrimage.

Several Asian and Western governments, the United Nations and the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York have offered to rescue the statues, and the Moroccan-based Islamic Organization for Education, Sciences and Culture said the statues represent "a true universal inheritance" that does no harm to Islam.

U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan's personal representative for Afghanistan, Francesc Vendrell, has returned to Islamabad, Pakistan, from Kabul, where he had met Friday with Taleban Foreign Minister Wakil Ahmed Muttawakil. According the United Nations' Web site, Vendrell urged that the edict be reversed.

If the edict is implemented, Vendrell told the Taleban, it will provoke outrage among the international community.

But the Taleban refused to acknowledge any pleas to halt the demolition -- including those from its closest ally, Pakistan.

Much of Afghanistan has been ravaged by years of civil war

"We have conveyed to them the international concern, in addition to bilateral concern, and we have asked them to show sensitivity to international sentiment in this matter," said Pakistani Foreign Ministry spokesman Riaz Mohammad Khan. "In our appeal we have said that we hope that the Afghan government will show the spirit of tolerance joined upon by Islam."

But Abdullah said Pakistani officials moved too late to save the statues.

"They made the threat three days ago, four days ago, and there wasn't any statement by Pakistan, either asking them not to do it or condemning it or anything like that. I think they only issued a statement when the Taleban had already started demolishing it," Abdullah said.

Phillippe de Montebello, director of the Metropolitan Museum, called the imminent destruction of the statues "cultural assassination." He said the museum has offered to purchase Afghan artifacts and put them on display somewhere "where they could be viewed not as cult objects, but as relics."

"These are world masterpieces, and they're firing artillery shells at them," he told CNN on Friday. "You're dealing with major monuments that could never be recreated, the manifestation of the highest aspirations of man at a certain period ... Once lost, they can never touch us again." Koichiro Matsuura, director-general of the United Nations world heritage body UNESCO, called the edict "a barbarian act." He said most international groups have no ability to influence the Islamic regime in Kabul.

Taleban forces are continuing to fight for control of all of Afghanistan's territory

"It's very, very frustrating to say the least," Matsuura said. "I sent a direct telegram to the Taleban leadership. Of course, there was no reply, no reaction."

The Taleban seized power over most of the country in 1996, after nearly 20 years of civil war punctuated by a decade of Soviet occupation. The ongoing struggle in Afghanistan has been worsened by a two-year drought has left more than a million people facing starvation or death as refugees in the cold.

The loss of the statues and other works of art in Afghanistan appears irreversible, and is likely to further undermine what little credibility the Taleban retains abroad.

"They are destroying statues that the entire world considers to be masterpieces," Matsuura said. "This is being done in the name of an interpretation of the Muslim faith that is not recognized anywhere else in the world."

CNN's Islamabad Bureau Chief Hannah Bloch and Paris Bureau Chief Peter Humi contributed to this report.

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