The Qeshm’s Geo-Park is the only Middle Eastern geo-park that has been listed by UNESCO.  This park because of negligence and standards that these parks need to have has received a red warning card from the UNESCO.  The red card is given as a warning that unless the list of warnings are not followed and corrected the park could be taken off the UNESCO’s list of natural national heritage list.

After giving a yellow card (which is the first warning) to the management of the park and giving them 2 years to help and bring the park to the original standards and up keeping, the park was given a red card in Jan 2013.  This was due to the lack of the response from the management of the park.

UNESCO had asked for a number of things to be done to bring the park back to the original conditions under which the park was listed as a natural national heritage park. These include: 1) creating signs throughout the park for better guidance of visitors, b) building more roads for the tourists to get to the park, c) creating hotels or places for tourists to stay close to the park, d) unapproved structures that were either blocking views or access to the park, e) close proximity to mines that were established later and after the UNESCO’s designation, f) destruction of beaches and selling of sand by the management of the park.

Mr. Bijan Darreh-shuri, one of the important people natural national heritage in Iran and the person who had with tremendous effort and work created this Geo-park in Iran, in a conversation with Save Passargad.com said “that the managers of Qeshm did not realize the great importance of this area for tourism and did not do what was needed.  “When we were there our management team was very strong and responsible and felt responsible before the people and the future of Iran and for that area.  Qeshm is an amazing geological area with vegetation and ecological importance that is about 100,000 acres.  For example Qeshm annually hosts 400 white pelican a year and these birds are so rare and currently extinct as only 1000 of them remain in the world.  And Qeshm is also one of the areas of the world that still remains a habitat for turtles. … But unfortunately after we left, other people came in and did not feel the same. Their irresponsible behavior led to the park being delisted by the UNESCO. ” Mr. Darreh-Shuri said.  In spite of this, Mr.Darreh-shuri says that:” I am positive that if the managers even now attempt to rectify and correct the past mistakes, the UNESCO will once again list the Qeshm’s Geo-park as a national environmental heritage.”

(photo credit: AP/The National Library of Israel)

The Jewish manuscripts which are believed to about 1,000 years old reveal details of a thriving Jewish society in what was then parts of Persian Empire.(http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/15/world/middleeast/documents-illuminate-jewish-life-in-ancient-muslim-empire.html?_r=0). The manuscripts were reportedly found in a cave in the mountainous northern area of Afghanistan and look very well preserved possibly because of the dry conditions in the cave. The manuscripts show details about the cultural, economic and religious life of the Jewish society at the time. The documents reportedly contain writings in Hebrew, Aramaic, Judeo-Arabic, and the unique Judea-Persian language of that era.

Recent news from Susa, one of the world’s oldest cities, show the evidence of termite infestation in the hall where the ancient artifacts are kept.

Ehsan Yaghmaei, a prominent Iranian archeologist who supervises the excavations in numerous old castles in Susa and is considered as the discoverer of Bardak-e-Siah Palace, an Archimedes remains, has told the ISNA, a government reporting agency that: “There is so much bad news about Susa that the invasion of the termites could be considered just a negligible event!”

He reports about the vast destructions that have taken place in the ancient sites of Susa and refers to the fact that these sites are now used as sheep pasture and a gathering place for the addicts.

He says: “At this moment, the Susa sites are neither under the supervision of local Cultural Heritage officers nor any other authority. They are now in the hands of those who are constructing a hotel right on the ancient site.”

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*Susa (Persian: ý Shush) was an ancient city of the, Elamite, Persian and Parthian empires of Iran. It is located in the lower Zagros Mountains about 250 km (160 mi) east of the Tigris River. The modern Iranian town of Shush is located at the site of ancient Susa. Shush is the administrative capital of the Shush County of Iran’s Khuzestan province.

Morteza Saghebfar, one of the prominent cultural figures of Iran, died on  Dec. 31. 2012, at the age of 70. His works, as a sociologist and an expert on Iranian history and culture, as well as his translation of many books in these areas, are considered as major sources of reference.

Shahyad monument in Tehran, Iran, that was renamed as Freedom Tower (Borj-e-Azadi) is in a bad shape due to having been left without care for a long time.

Cyrene, the ancient city in Libya is turned into pasture for sheep due to the war and negligence.

Virgin Castle (Ghal’e ye Dokhtar), the ancient fortification in Bishabour, Iran, has been turned into a pasture for sheep due to negligence of authorities.

According to a report from Azad University of Kermanshah, Runak Gravandi, a doctorate student and a member of geology department, has succeeded in discovering a kind of 73-million-year old fossil, in the neighborhood of Kermanshah (Western part of Iran)

 
Runak Gravandi, while commenting on her discovery, said, “ While executing scientific research in the areas near Kermanshah I discovered a few sample of coral fossils, as well as some non-coral ones.” She acknowledged, “In order to validate this discovery, I contacted Professor Mohammad al-Jamil, a famous geologist at Cairo University. After examining the samples and the relevancy of information about them, he agreed that the fossils are 73 million years showing that Kermanshah was a part of a shallow see during that period.”

Persepolis is in danger of extinction.* 

Pictures by: Farzad Aryan

Due to the intentional negligence of the authorities with no attempt to stop the natural wear and tear of the site, Persepolis is eroding rapidly.

Newest pictures show how humidity and the growing lichens are threatening the ancient bas-reliefs.

*Persepolis was the ceremonial capital of the Achaemenid Empire (ca. 550–330 BCE). Persepolis is situated 70 km northeast of the modern city of Shiraz in the Fars Province of modern Iran. The earliest remains of Persepolis date from around 515 BCE. UNESCO declared the citadel of Persepolis a World Heritage Site in 1979.

(Click on the photo to see a close up of the damage)

Tagh-e-Bostan is a magnificent site of ancient history in the western Iranian plateau. Reza Kamali from Tehran reports that 7 years ago, immediately after the advent of a popular movement to apply for the recognition of the site by the UNESCO as a World Heritage, a series of unexpected operations began to happen in and on the vicinity of this site with the clear aim of its destruction and stopping such recognition.

All sorts of so-called “development projects” were introduce, including the construction of a rail-road and erecting a large dome on a near by religious site that altered the whole scenery of Tagh-e-Bostan eliminating the chances of the site to be recognized as a World heritage.

Keeping the main parts of the site exposed to natural elements was another neglecting policy.

When finally last year the Cultural Heritage Organization declared that it has decided to apply to UNESCO and intends to “prepare” the site for that reason, it turned the whole site into a construction site and brought in machinery and untrained work force – a situation that resembled a mining operation rather than repairing an ancient site. Then the surprising part of the story was the revealed. The Organization declared it never had the intention of sending the Tagh-e-Bostan file to UNESCO.

Immediately all the previous reports and news items relevant to Tagh-e-Bostan was removed from the Internet sites controlled by the government.

The devastation inflicted on Tagh-e-Bostan is so extensive that even if an authority would decide to apply for recognition by the UNESCO, it will not pass the criteria used to select a site for that purpose.

By Al Arabiya

An Egyptian jihad leader, with self-professed links to the Taliban, called for
the “destruction of the Sphinx and the Giza Pyramids in Egypt,” drawing ties between the Egyptian relics and Buddha statues, local media reported this week.

Murgan Salem al-Gohary, an Islamist leader twice-sentenced under former President Hosni Mubarak for advocating violence, called on Muslims to remove such “idols.”

“All Muslims are charged with applying the teachings of Islam to remove such idols, as we did in Afghanistan when we destroyed the Buddha statues,” he said on Saturday during a television interview on an Egyptian private channel, widely watched by Egyptian and Arab audiences.

“God ordered Prophet Mohammed to destroy idols,” he added. “When I was with the Taliban we destroyed the statue of Buddha, something the government failed to do.”

His comments came a day after thousands of ultraconservative Islamists gathered in Tahrir Square to call for the strict application of Sharia law in the new constitution.

But in retaliation to Gohary’s remarks, the vice president of Tunisia’s Ennahda party, Sheikh Abdel Fattah Moro, called the live program and told Gohary that famous historic military commander Amr ibn al-Aas did not destroy statues when he conquered Egypt.

“So who are you to do it?” he wondered. “The Prophet destroyed the idols because people worshiped them, but the Sphinx and the Pyramids are not worshiped.”

Gohary, 50, is well-known in Egypt for his advocacy of violence, Egypt Independent reported.

“He was sentenced twice, one of the two sentences being life imprisonment. He subsequently fled Egypt to Afghanistan, where he was badly injured in the American invasion. In 2007, he traveled from Pakistan to Syria, which then handed him over to Egypt. After Mubarak’s fall in early 2011, he was released from prison by a judicial ruling,” the newspaper added.

In recent months, fears have surfaced that the ultra-conservative Salafi political powers may soon wish to debate new guidelines over Egyptian antiquities.

Islamists have swept the recent presidential and parliamentary elections in the country’s post-revolutionary stage, with the Muslim Brotherhood and the ultra-conservative Salafi Islamists rising to political power.

“The fundamental Salafis have demanded to cover Pharaonic statues, because they regard them to be idols,” Egyptian author on ancient history Ahmed Osman told Al Arabiya English, explaining that Salafi Muslims follow conservative religious principles which view statues and sculptures as prohibited in Islam.

“But so far the government has done nothing to indicate what is the future of Egyptian antiquities,” adds Osman.

Many hope that Egypt’s new President Mohammed Mursi will help usher better preservation of Egypt’s proud cultural heritage. Egyptian officials have recently announced the country will reveal more of its ancient buried treasures.

The tomb of Queen Meresankh III, the granddaughter of Khufu, of Great Pyramid fame, is set to be opened to tourists later this year, with the last resting places of five high priests also slated to be put on show.

Officials are also believed to be reopening the underground Serapeum temple at Sakkara, to the south of Cairo.