Culture, memory and ravages of war

The ravages of war are never confined to the battlefield.

- KAREL KOMÁREK is founder of the investment group KKCG and co-founder of the Karel Komárek Family Foundation.

The costs are borne by all of society, and when bombs destroy monuments, artworks, and irreplaceable archives, the losses are measured not just in lives and property but in broader historical terms.

Identity, memory, and cultural heritage are what sustain a society through its darkest hours, and their destruction erodes civilization itself. By the same token, the desecration or loss of items that a culture holds sacred can fuel new cycles of grievance, despair, and righteous violence.

The connection between cultural preservation and peace is one reason why governments from around the world came together in 1954 to adopt The Hague Convention for the Protection of Cultural Property in the Event of Armed Conflict. It obliges all parties to identify cultural heritage sites and items, to provide for their protection, and to help enforce sanctions for breaches of the convention. Yet despite such formal commitments, the loss of cultural heritage in conflict zones remains an urgent problem.

Protecting cultural heritage is not some low-priority objective that should be addressed only after all other wartime needs have been met. More often than not, the targeting of priceless treasures is part of the aggressor's strategy.

A decade ago, when the Islamic State was seizing territory and committing mass atrocities in Syria and Iraq, "cultural cleansing" was central to the group's activities. As UNESCO Director General Irina Bokova and Abdulaziz Othman Altwaijri of the Islamic Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization noted in March 2015, ISIS's destruction of the ancient city of Hatra, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, was directly motivated by its propaganda strategy.