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Afghanistan’s revered Bamiyan Buddha statues were destroyed by the Taliban – should they be rebuilt?

Statues were blasted in April 2001 by the Taliban, who had taken control of the province and killed thousands of civilians

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Afghan archaeological guard Hakim Safam in front of the reconstructed foot of the Salsal Buddha. Photo: AFP

For centuries they stood, two monumental ancient statues of Buddha carved into the cliffs of Bamiyan, loved and revered by generations of Afghans – only to be pulverised by the Taliban in an act of cultural genocide.

It felt like the loss of family for many who live and tend their crops nearby – but some 15 years on they are hopeful these awe-inspiring relics can be reconstructed. But experts are divided on the value of rebuilding the artefacts, with some insisting it is more important to preserve the remains of the entire crumbling site.

In the villages local people very much want the Buddhas to be rebuilt ... They are always asking us, when will you be ready to begin?
Rassoul Chojai, University of Bamiyan

Archaeologists and restorers, mostly Afghan, German, Japanese and French, working in the Bamiyan Valley in central Afghanistan will meet this week in Munich, Germany.

There they will try to move forward on the issue, as much a matter of the conservation of the Unesco World Heritage Site as of the memories and culture of a brutalised community.

All Afghans, especially the peasants tending potatoes at the front of the cliffs, mourn the loss of the tutelary silhouettes – the largest, the Salsal, was 56 metres high; its feminine version, the Shamama, 38 metres.

They were blasted in April 2001 by the Taliban, who had taken control of the province and killed thousands of Hazara civilians, a Shiite Muslim minority in Bamiyan.

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