Thursday, February 10, 2011

Disruptions in Kharga and Assiut

There have been reports of a very unofficial nature of attacks on, or damage to, the museums of Assiut and Kharga. Please note - both of these reports remain to be verified. If anyone hears anything more official please let me know:
andie @ oddthing. co. uk

Kate and I have been trying to track down what is happening in Kharga (see Kate's post for the latest news), but apart from the fact that the oasis in clearly in a crisis (the photos emerging are unsettling) there is no independently confirmed news about exactly what is happening or how the museum has been impacted. One report on Twitter suggested that a march on the museum had been organized, but there is no news to confirm whether there really was such a plan and, if there was, whether it was actioned. All terribly infuriating!
UPDATED
- Thanks to Kate for posting that Salima Ikram has apparently said on Facebook that the Kharga museum is fine at the moment (I don't know who Salima Ikram's sources are). There has also been an official statement that although a number of official buildings were destroyed in Kharga, (referred to in the article as Al Wadi Al Gadeed, which means "the new valley") the Kharga Museum has not been harmed, although again it does not say who in Kharga provided the information:

On his part, Sabri Abdel Aziz, head of the ancient Egyptian section, asserted that the museum in Al-Wadi Al-Gadeed has been unaffected by recent violent clashes in the governorate. The police station, prosecutor's office and National Democratic Party headquarters were destroyed by fire in the early hours of Wednesday.

The news from Assiut is even more vague, with one article on Al Masry Al Youm suggesting that the museum has been targeted as a representative of government injustice.


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