They have an entire division dedicated to mining. They should have reviewed, and explained to the Afghans, the various technical options, and the risks. When we first got involved in , we met a lot of very unhappy archaeologists. The mining company had told the Afghan government in that they were going to start work in a few months, and that the site would have to be hermetically sealed off because of the explosives they would be employing, and if they wanted any of the relics to be saved, they should bring in salvage archaeologists to remove anything that could be dismantled.
After three months, they extended it by another three, then by six … the constant short deadlines had caused the archaeologists to work in artificial haste, not taking time to document much, just piling whatever they could remove into storage facilities. In fact, opening a mine of this type takes four to six years, and all the urgency had been a deception.
We tried to convince the World Bank to hold a meeting of the mining company, the archaeologists, and neutral subject matter experts, to see if maybe there was a win-win solution. Top-notch professionals from the relevant fields, plus the French archaeologists from Mes Aynak, gave us three days of their time pro bono.
Based on their subject matter knowledge, they concluded that first of all there was no rush and NO reason to be conducting rescue archaeology. Second, mining and archaeological work could continue in parallel for the entire lifetime of the mine, given good will and frank coordination. Third, they were highly alarmed by the absence of an environmental impact study and a mine closing plan.
Best practices were clearly not being followed here, and the risks were great, in terms of heritage loss and environmental ruin.
We filed a comprehensive complaint with the Inspection Panel of the World Bank which was financing and overseeing the management of the mining project Eligibility Report and Inspection Panel.
We also made sure to provide information to civil society groups internationally and local to Logar Province who undertook activities to protect Mes Aynak. We published in international media outlets. Ironically, it was the deteriorating security situation in Logar Province — where Mes Aynak is located — that gave this historic treasure a second chance.
The mining company folded its tents and departed, and for a few years, all was quiet on the slightly plundered, but mostly still safely buried site. Last year, in , that slumber ended, and discussions for a revival of the contract commenced. On a positive note, the Afghan government under President Ashraf Ghani seems more attentive to the cultural heritage aspect and the environmental risks.
They have told us that the value of this historic treasure is fully clear to them, and that they intend to exercise due diligence to ensure that all technical options are investigated and considered, and that an informed decision is made. They have stated their intention to finally organize that meeting of neutral subject matter experts, and to give them access to whatever information presently exists.
That would be really good, we have our fingers crossed and will keep you posted. This is not our first rodeo. The contract is now available only in English. A copy of a draft contract from April was leaked in March War and the ongoing looting of artifacts—two of the most devastating cases: the Bamiyan Buddhas and Ai Khanum city—have robbed Afghans of deepening their cultural understanding. If mining is conducted in Mes Aynak, it will destroy the entire historic Buddhist city, including Bronze Age artifacts that are still underground.
Mining will also require forced relocation of seven villages around the Aynak Copper Mine, and devastate the watershed of Afghanistan. Mes Aynak has sparked international campaigns by Afghans, environmentalists, Buddhists, archaeologists and other supporters aiming to stop the destruction of this culturally and spiritually significant site. Petition signatures were also given to former Afghan president Hamid Karzai, which he ignored. Though mining is currently suspended due to political insecurity and economic disputes, the MJAM contract is still upheld by the Ministry of Mines while Mes Aynak is awaiting complete destruction.
Afghan archaeologists have not had the chance to fully explore and analyze Mes Aynak. Mining of this site will prevent full understanding of the historical, cultural, and spiritual implications of Mes Aynak as an ancient city and sacred site. The world witnessed as the Bamiyan Buddhas, the largest Buddha statue of the world, fell to the ground in It would be an absolute catastrophe if Mes Aynak meets the same end as the Bamiyan Buddhas—this time, while in pursuit of wealth rather than political extremism.
Given that the final, signed contract was not released publicly until , seven years after the signing of the contract, and that the agreement has not been translated into Pashto or Dari, the people of Aynak—who are all scheduled to be or have already been involuntarily relocated from their villages—are left at a disadvantage concerning the mining contract and their rights to land and water.
The contract does not require consultation between MJAM and the villages. MoM has attempted to fill this gap independent of MJAM but there are still many alarming issues that work at the disadvantage of the people of Aynak.
MoM has yet to outline how villagers can directly voice their concerns and complaints about the mining project or their relocation. MoM plans to provide the following reparations to the affected villages, in accordance with World Bank Operational Policies for Involuntary Resettlement:. A t the time of publication, MoM has distributed six plots of residence to involuntarily relocated families and heavy Afghan security is required to protect the mine site.
There has been absolutely no indication as to whether the Ashab Baba plots are of equal quality compared to the original villages and desirability for the villagers. Geographically speaking, the resettlement area is parallel to a mountain, which is known for dangerous, life-threatening environmental activity during the winter. Its mountains and valleys were a major intellectual crossroads where the Hellenistic, Persian, Central Asian, Tibetan, Indian and Chinese worlds met and fused.
Today, of course, part of what is so fascinating about the civilisation of the cities of the Silk Route is the sheer remoteness of these exotic-sounding places. Yet what most distinguished Mes Aynak in the early first millennium AD was the opposite: the fabulously wealthy and cosmopolitan nature of the society that thrived there. At this period, Afghanistan was the epicentre of classical globalisation: midway on the trade route from Rome to China, traders came to Afghanistan from all over the world, bringing painted glass from Antioch, inlaid gold vessels from Byzantium, porphyry from Upper Egypt, ivories from South India, carpets from Persia, horses from Mongolia and Siberia, and lacquers and silk from the China coast.
It was through these now-remote valleys that ideas of art, decorum, dress, religion and court culture passed backwards and forwards, east to west and back again, mixing and melding to create the most unexpected conjuctions. The slowly decaying remains of the culture that emerged from this extraordinary clash and fusion of civilisations still litters much of Afghanistan and northern Pakistan. One of the centres of this process was the region of Gandhara, whose centre lay around Peshawar in the North-West Frontier province of Pakistan.
After the death of Alexander the Great in BC the Greek garrisons of India and Afghanistan found themselves cut off from their Mediterranean homeland, and had no choice but to stay on, intermingling with the local peoples, and leavening Indian learning with classical philosophy.
The Bactrian Greeks survived for 1, years, long after Greek civilisation had disappeared in Europe. Kings with names such as Diomedes of the Punjab, Menander of Kabul and Heliochles of Balkh, ruled over a remarkable Indo-Hellenistic civilisation that grew up in what is now the Taliban heartlands of the Federally Administered Tribal Agencies Fata and eastern Afghanistan.
This civilisation was later cross-fertilised by new influences brought by the Kushans who succeeded the Bactrian Greeks as rulers of Afghanistan, while adopting much of their culture.
It left behind it a legacy of finely constructed and richly designed Buddhist monasteries such as Mes Aynak. In the area between Kabul and Peshawar, one fifth-century Chinese traveller counted no fewer than 2, such shrines — as well as a scattering of well-planned classical cities, acropoli, amphitheatres and stupas.
Gandharan art used motifs borrowed from classical Roman art, with its vine scrolls, cherubs and centaurs, but its principal icon was a handsome, languid, meditating Buddha, dressed in a Greek toga. The Hellenistic influence of Gandhara is immediately apparent at Mes Aynak — in the Corinthian capitals that support the plinths on which the Buddha meditates; in the bearded tritons who seem to have wandered off some Mediterranean sarcophagus; and in the terracotta figures of ascetics that closely resemble those found at the Bactrian Greek site of Ai-Khanoum with their pointed goatee beards and intense wide-eyed stares.
There is much Indian influence too. Several black-schist figures have been dug up showing the Buddha standing, meditating, preaching and fasting.
In one image, now in the Kabul Museum and known as The Pensive Bodhisattva , the young Prince Siddhartha is shown sitting under a Pipal tree, clad in dhoti, turban and necklaces. His muscles ripple beneath the diaphanous folds of the toga. The saviour's hair is oiled and groomed.
His face is full, round and classical: the nose small and straight; the lips firm and proud. Art historians believe the sculpture came from a workshop located at Bagram, under the US airbase whose notorious prison was recently handed over to the Afghans under pressure from Karzai. Yet as time went on, Indian and western classical motifs increasingly give way to an ever-greater eastern influence, as the T'ang Chinese army moved along the sides of the Taklamakan desert and the Tarim basin to take over Xinjiang to the immediate north-west of Afghanistan.
One of the most exquisite finds at Mes Aynak is a gilt Buddha head, with eyes half closed, poised on the threshold of enlightenment; it feels more Burmese than Central Asian.
Fabulous frescoes reveal the increasing influence of both Uyghur and Chinese mural techniques: the compositions look increasingly like the work uncovered by the great turn-of-the-century Silk Road archaeologist Aurel Stein at the Cave of a Thousand Buddhas in Dunhuang.
The delicacy of the silks, the elongated eyes, and the lightness of the brushstrokes depicting white iris-like flowers show the growing influence of T'ang Chinese art. The same process that can be seen in the art dug out of Mes Aynak — a surprisingly strong western presence slowly giving way to Chinese influence from the east — is a story that is likely to be repeated all over the region in the next few decades.
For there is a growing conviction these days in Afghanistan that China could end up the ultimate winner here, after the US withdrawal in But this is now beginning to change. In September , the Chinese security chief, Zhou Yongkang, visited Kabul and announced a turnaround in Chinese policy.
As well as signing contracts for more mining and oil exploration, the Chinese announced plans for road- and rail-building projects linking north-east Afghanistan with western China through the Wakhan Corridor.
China has also made a start on security co-operation with Karzai's regime, and is currently training a first batch of Afghan policemen.
The politics of this are delicate, but, potentially, extremely important. China is possibly the only country to which the Pakistani security establishment defers.
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