Wars raging across the globe are taking a devastating toll not only on human lives but on humanity’s shared cultural heritage—and almost no one is being held responsible for it.
In Ukraine, a surge of Russian drone and missile strikes in August battered Kyiv, Odesa and Mykolaiv, damaging six UNESCO-protected sites in Odesa alone, including the 19th-century Alexandru Sturdza House. Ukraine’s culture ministry says 148 heritage sites were damaged or destroyed last month. Activist groups have filed complaints with the International Criminal Court accusing Russia of cultural destruction and looting, but no charges have followed.
Experts say the problem isn’t a lack of evidence—satellite imagery and monitoring make documentation easier than ever—but rather jurisdiction and political will. No state has ever been prosecuted for destroying cultural property, despite a 1954 international treaty, adopted in The Hague after World War II, that obliges nations to protect monuments, art and historic sites during conflict.
The pattern repeats elsewhere. Gaza’s Great Omari Mosque, a landmark tracing 2,000 years of the city’s identity, was largely destroyed in a 2023 Israeli strike. In Iran, more than 100 sites—including Tehran’s Golestan Palace—were reportedly damaged during a US-Israeli aerial campaign. In Sudan, civil war has halted preservation of the ancient Meroe Pyramids, leaving them exposed to erosion.
Read the full BBC report for more on why accountability remains so elusive.
Source: Cultural treasures are being destroyed worldwide – so why is no-one being punished? (feeds.bbci.co.uk).
Image: Imahinasyon Photography, BY 2.0 (via Openverse).