Culture Under Threat Conference

A US Army tank outside part of the Iraq National Museum in March 2003. (Photo: Joanne Farchakh Bajjaly)

Peter Stone is co-organising the Call for Papers for Culture Under Threat, a joint conference organised by the American University of Rome, Blue Shield, World Archaeological Congress, and Newcastle University.

2014 marks the 60^th anniversary of the 1954 Hague Convention on the Protection of Cultural Property in the Event of Armed Conflict and its 1^st Protocol and also the 15^th anniversary of its 2^nd Protocol. Sadly, almost every part of the world has seen armed conflict since 1954 and cultural property has been damaged in all of these conflicts through collateral destruction, military insensitivities, and extensive looting.

The conference will be held May 15-21, 2014, at the American University of Rome. It will review what actions are currently taken to mitigate the destruction of cultural property during conflict and address what might be done in the future to enhance its protection and to restrict and counter the trade in illicit antiquities that feeds off conflict. The conference will conclude with a discussion of a draft of the World Archaeological Congress’ Accord on the Protection of Cultural Property in the Event of Armed Conflict.

Call for Papers: Abstracts of no more than 200 words for papers should be sent to peter.stone@newcastle.ac.uk or friedrich.schipper@univie.ac.at by Monday 14 April 2014. Authors of accepted papers will be notified by Monday 21 April.