CULTURAL SECURITY IN MALI: SOME LESSONS AND POLICY OPTIONS 1

Institute for African Culture And International Understanding Olusegun Obasanjo Presidential Library

Olusegun Obasanjo Presidential Library

Institute for African Culture and International Understanding

Policy BriefNo. 1, November 2013

Cultural Security in Mali:Some Lessons and Policy Options for Africa and

the Rest of the World

IACIU Policy Brief is a quarterly publication of the Institute for African Culture and International Understanding, a UNESCO Category 2 Institute at the Olusegun Obasanjo Presidential Library, Abeokuta, Nigeria.

The series of Policy Briefs is designed to meet the needs of policy-makers, culture experts and development specialists in addressing emerging issues on African culture and the promotion of international understanding within and outside the Africa region. The aim is to develop key messages to support evidence-informed policy-making. The Policy Briefs will synthesise existing research knowledge on a policy or practice issue of importance. They will address the questions: What is the research evidence related to a given policy or practice and what policy recommendations follow from the evidence?

Summary

Mali is an African addition to the global list of countries in which insurgents now pursue cultural cleansing and collateral damage to cultural heritage. In 2012, fourteen of the Timbuktu mausoleums and exotic manuscript centres, including those that are part of the UNESCO World Heritage, were damaged by armed groups who took over the northern part of the country. If it happened in Mali so successfully, it could happen elsewhere. What is needed now is to take some lessons from the experience. This Policy Brief identifies some of the lessons and provides some policy options for countries who are in the throes of or have an emerging potential for similar insurgency. One of the lessons is that insurgents have now appreciated the symbolic significance of cultural patrimony probably more than state actors and would not mind attacking it in situations of armed conflict to gain strategic advantage or generate funds for their insurgencies. The experience in Mali requires that all other African countries should now audit the measures they have in place towards protecting cultural properties in their jurisdiction. Also, more resources should be committed to digitising the kinds of exotic manuscripts that were destroyed in Mali. It is also necessary to get security agencies interested and involved in providing physical security for immovable cultural properties. As African states reflect on the conflict in Mali and what UNESCO and others are doing to help the situation, the focus should not be exclusively on physical security, they should also consider cultural security given its wide-ranging human security implications for Africa and the rest of the world.

Introduction

Mali is one of the sixteen countries in the West Africa sub-region. It is the cultural epicentre of the ancient Ghana, Malinke

and Songhai empires which linked Western Africa with the Mediterranean and Middle Eastern centres of civilisation. Since 2012, the country has been going through a period of armed conflict that affects every aspect of its history. Existing knowledge shows that during such moments of armed conflict, insurgents direct their attack at national infrastructure and assets as part of their larger strategy of making the society ungovernable and overthrowing those managing it. Hence, what every government in war does is to provide maximum security for these infrastructure

Published by the Institute for African Culture And International UnderstandingOlusegun Obasanjo Presidential Library, Abeokuta, Nigeria

CULTURAL SECURITY IN MALI: SOME LESSONS AND POLICY OPTIONS 2

Institute for African Culture And International Understanding Olusegun Obasanjo Presidential Library

which include roads, bridges, water and sewer systems, airports, sea ports, and public buildings such as schools, health facilities, prisons, recreation facilities, electric power production, fire safety, waste disposal, and communications services. These facilities are specially protected because the society cannot run without them. Recent experience in Mali and the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region in which armed groups attacked cultural properties, suggests that the time is ripe for nations of the world to look beyond the narrow confines of protecting national infrastructure to prioritising cultural patrimony on the list of what should be protected during armed conflicts. This observation derives from some policy gaps evident in the damage caused to cultural properties by the armed groups in Mali. The situation reminds us of some existing international Conventions on the protection of cultural properties and their questioned effectiveness in situations of armed conflict.

The Pillage of Cultural Properties in Mali

Mali is one of the few countries in West Africa with living evidence of human civilisation dating from the middle Palaeolithic to modern times. Present day Mali evolved from the legendary Ghana, Mali, Songhai, Mossi and Segou kingdoms and empires, It has several historic and archaeological sites and a large collection of manuscripts, theological and scientific treaties dating back to the pre-Islamic era. So significant are the cultural properties of the country that since the late 1980s, UNESCO had to submit some of the cultural sites to its World Heritage List. These include some traditional toguere-built houses at the old town of Djenne; three main mosques, Djingareyber, Sankore and Sidi Yahia as well as 16 cemeteries and mausoleums in the city of Timbuktu; the tomb of Askia the great; the cliff of Bandiagana and several other cultural sites ofhistorical significance. Considering the importance attached to these historic and archaeological sites, one would have expected such cultural patrimony to be adequately protected during the armed conflicts in Mali given some existing Conventions on the protection of cultural properties in situations of armed conflict. The most significant of these Conventions are the 1954 Hague Convention on Protection of Cultural properties in the Event of Armed Conflict and the 1970 UNESCO Convention which recognise the significance of cultural patrimony in armed conflict and foreign affairs. Both Conventions expect belligerents in situations of armed conflict to show respect for cultural properties. It is unfortunate that the armed groups in Mali did not show any respect for these Conventions. The government of Mali also lacked enough capacity to provide the kind of protection expected of it. As the armed conflict in the country started in 2012, fourteen of the Timbuktu mausoleums and exotic manuscript centres, including those that are part of the UNESCO World Heritage, were damaged by the armed groups who took over the northern part of the country and established an unrecognised Islamist state in the

What is the cultural strategic importance of Mali?

Extent of damage to cultural patrimony

CULTURAL SECURITY IN MALI: SOME LESSONS AND POLICY OPTIONS 3

Institute for African Culture And International Understanding Olusegun Obasanjo Presidential Library

region of Azawad. They tagged cultural properties unIslamic (haram). In addition to damaging them and burning historic manuscripts, the armed groups prohibited all cultural practices and expressions. So impactful was the onslaught that by August 2012, the UNESCO World Cultural Centre (WHC) had to put the city of Timbuktu and the Tomb of Askia in Mali on the list of World Heritage in Danger (Varoutsikos 2012:2). The damage to the cultural properties in Mali was preceded by some warning signs; it did not come suddenly. If the capacity was not lacking, the needed protection could have been organised. For example, the BBC News of June 3, 2013 reported that before the armed groups arrived to carry out their final onslaught, some of the exotic manuscripts in the libraries were ferried into safety by Dr Abdel Kader Haidara, owner of one of Timbuktu’s biggest private libraries, containing manuscripts dating back to the 16th Century. He was assisted by other big book-owning families, together with officials of the state-run Ahmed Baba Institute to hide the major collections in private homes. Hence when the armed groups set fire on two key libraries in Timbuktu, some important documents were spared from the inferno for future generations. Plate 1 shows some of the manuscripts in metal boxes taken into safe custody before the arrival of the armed groups while Plates 2a and 2b show destroyed manuscripts and efforts to archive some of what was salvaged.

Plate 1: Dr Haidara, who masterminded the rescue, with boxes of manuscripts

Plate 2 a: Ancient manuscripts of high value destroyed by the armed groups

Plate 2b: Archiving some salvaged materials through UNESCO support

Source: BBC News Magazine, 3 June 2013, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-22704960

A tale of one of the heroes who came to the rescue

CULTURAL SECURITY IN MALI: SOME LESSONS AND POLICY OPTIONS 4

Institute for African Culture And International Understanding Olusegun Obasanjo Presidential Library

Protection: A Missed Opportunity

The number of boxes in Plate 1 and the space they occupy takes us back to the debate on the possible use of technology for protecting such documents. The debate can be broken into two. There are those who argue that the energy dissipated by the likes of Haidara on carting the documents into safety would not have been necessary if all of them had been digitised. The documents would have been permanently saved. The flip side of the debate is that the computer-saved version of such exotic documents cannot replace the original. Many researchers would find more fulfillment in touching and working with the original manuscript. The middle-ground argument is “half-bread is better than none”. Where the documents are digitised, the assurance is provided that people can always have access to their contents. But digitisation here is not saying that the original should not be physically protected. As we digitise, more resources should be committed to physical protection. The experience in Mali and the MENA region shows that it is easier to protect manuscripts than immovable cultural properties. If the likes of Haidara who took some of the Mali manuscripts into private custody had the capacity, they would have also protected the mosques and mausoleums in Timbuktu. But unlike manuscripts, the immovable cultural properties could not be spared the attack of the armed groups. The armed groups damaged a number of them including mosques which bear witness to the golden age of Timbuktu at the end of the Askia dynasty. They played an essential role in the spread of Islam in Africa and were restored for future generations in the 16th century by Imam Al Aqib. It took the armed groups few hours to damage this cultural patrimony. How the mosques were damaged is instructive for a discussion of this nature focusing on protection of cultural properties. The insurgents took their time to cause the damage. The Al Jazeera news of 10 July 2012 reported that on the occasion of one of the attacks, about a dozen of the armed groups came in an armoured four-wheel drive truck, armed with pickaxes and hoes. They fired in the air to intimidate people and started smashing the tombs. What measures should be put in place in the future for averting such terror attack on cultural properties?

Lessons for Cultural SecurityMali is an African addition to the global list of countries in which insurgents now pursue cultural cleansing and inflict collateral damage to cultural heritage. The other countries with this kind of experience include Afghanistan, Iraq and Syria. In these countries, cultural properties were either attacked for ideological reasons or looted for funds to continue the insurgency. In Mali, the main objective seems to be to ensure that no evidence of Sufi saints survives. In other words, the attacks are for ideological reasons but some of the vandalised cultural properties could have also fallen in the hands of transnational organised criminals seeking to make money from them. If it happened in Mali so successfully, it could happen elsewhere. What is needed now is to take some lessons from the experience. The first lesson is that insurgents have now appreciated the symbolic significance of cultural patrimony probably more than state actors and would not mind attacking it in situations of armed conflict to gain strategic advantage or generate funds for their insurgencies. The second lesson is encapsulated in the ease with which insurgents destroy cultural properties during armed conflict. This questions existing security measures and commitment for protecting them. It suggests that the protection of cultural properties is not taken too seriously by governments. If an individual could take so many of the manuscripts into safety what efforts were particularly made by the government of

Key Lessons

1. Insurgents have now appreciated the symbolic significance of cultural patrimony probably more than state actors and would not mind attacking it in situations of armed conflict to gain strategic advantage or generate funds for their insurgencies.

2. Undue advantage can be taken if there is a lax in existing security measures and commitment to protecting them.

3. Security officials are still not adequately schooled in the knowledge of protecting cultural properties as critical national infrastructure and asset.

Could a stitch in time have saved nine?

CULTURAL SECURITY IN MALI: SOME LESSONS AND POLICY OPTIONS 5

Institute for African Culture And International Understanding Olusegun Obasanjo Presidential Library

Mali before the armed groups arrived at the cultural sites? The third lesson is that we all live in a world where security officials are still not adequately schooled in the knowledge of cultural properties as critical national infrastructure and asset. They also lack adequate knowledge on how to protect these precious resources in situations of armed conflict.

Policy Options

The experience in Mali requires that all other African countries should now audit the measures they have in place towards protecting cultural properties in their jurisdiction. This is because even in times of peace, nations of the world are expected to protect cultural properties. “Protection” according to Article 4(7) of the UNESCO Convention on the Protection and Promotion of the Diversity of Cultural Expressions 2005, means the adoption of measures aimed at preservation, safeguarding and enhancement of cultural diversity. Aside from the factor of being on the World Heritage list, Mali got immediate support from the international community for protecting its cultural properties on the grounds that it is a signatory to all relevant international conventions on the protection of cultural patrimony. The UNESCO Conventions on the protection of cultural heritage, which have been ratified by Mali include:

• Convention concerning the Protection of the World Cultural and Natural Heritage (1972), ratified by Mali on 5 April 1977;

• Convention for the Protection of Cultural properties in the Event of Armed Conflict (1954), ratified by Mali on 18 May 1961, and its 1999 Second Protocol to which it acceded on 15 November 2012;

• Convention on the fight against illicit trafficking of cultural properties (1970), ratified by Mali on 6 April 1987; and

• Convention for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage (2003), ratified by Mali on 3 June 2005.

Mali should be commended as the foregoing presents it as a model in commitment to the protection of cultural properties. As we reflect on Mali, questions should be asked around the number of African countries that have ratified relevant conventions on the protection of cultural heritage. How would a government that has refused to commit itself to protecting cultural properties during peace be expected to have invested heavily in protecting cultural properties during armed conflict? This is a policy-relevant question for the whole of Africa and the rest of the world. The experience in Mali would not have happened if the armed groups in the country were committed to relevant international legal order. The most significant legal framework in this case is the 1954 Hague Convention on Protection of Cultural properties in the Event of Armed Conflict and the 1970 UNESCO Convention which recognise the significance of cultural patrimony in armed conflict and foreign affairs. Both Conventions expect belligerents in situations of armed conflict to show respect for cultural properties. The point must be made here that by the time the mausoleums in Mali were attacked, northern Mali was under the control of the armed groups. There was therefore little that the government of Mali could have done. The speedy intervention of UNESCO in having the cultural properties in Mali on the list of World Heritage in Danger and providing financial support for necessary repairs should be commended. UNESCO is also working with the Malian Ministry of Culture to restore the damaged infrastructure. It is also collaborating with INTERPOL’s Works of Art unit to protect, preserve and restore Mali’s treasured cultural sites. All of these efforts raise questions on what other international organisations could

Key Policy Options

1. All countries should enact or strengthen policies relating to audit of existing measures of protecting cultural properties in their jurisdiction. Identified gaps in the measures should be urgently bridged.

2. All countries as a matter of policy should take steps to ratify all international Treaties and Conventions on cultural security if they have not already done so.

3. The Policy on cultural security should be expanded to go beyond physical security of cultural properties to include high-tech surveillance and education of the citizenry of the value of the country’s cultural patrimony. The policy should underscore that cultural security is the responsibility of all.

CULTURAL SECURITY IN MALI: SOME LESSONS AND POLICY OPTIONS 6

Institute for African Culture And International Understanding Olusegun Obasanjo Presidential Library

or should do to help the ugly situation. The United Nations Security Council set a good example in this respect by adopting its Resolution 2100 on April 25, 2013 which established a peacekeeping force for Mali effective July 1 2013. The mandate of this UN Multidimensional Integrated Stabilisation Mission in Mali (MINUSMA) included “Support for cultural preservation” (Section 16f of the UN Resolution) and need for the military peacekeepers to “operate mindfully in the vicinity of cultural and historical sites” (Section 32). To achieve this objective, UNESCO established partnership with MINUSMA on the training of the peacekeepers sent to Mali. As African states and other countries of the world reflect on the conflict in Mali and what UNESCO and others are doing to help the situation, the focus should not be exclusively on physical security; they should also consider cultural security given its wide-ranging human security implications. The words of the UNESCO Director-General Irina Bokova are golden in this respect. During a visit to Mali in February 2013, she observed that “When a World Heritage site is destroyed, because of stupidity and violence, the whole of humanity feels it has been deprived of part of itself; that it has been injured.” Both African Union (AU) and the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) should within this framework rethink their roles in protecting cultural properties in Mali as UNESCO is now doing on behalf of the global community. Conclusion and Recommendations

Taking all the facts together, two protection measures are of immediate importance in Mali and other cultural sites around the world. More resources should be committed to digitising the kinds of exotic manuscripts destroyed in Mali. It is also necessary to get security agencies within Mali and in the West Africa sub-region interested and involved in providing physical security for immovable cultural properties. This means that security academies should now have courses on how to recognise and protect exotic cultural properties. The focus of such training programmes should not be on physical protection alone but also gathering of actionable intelligence on possible future threats to the safety of these physical objects. The letters of the UNSC Resolution 2100 also reminds us that except military peacekeepers operate with great discretion during their operations, they too could hurt cultural properties. Trainers of peacekeepers should disseminate this information to their trainees during pre-deployment training and exercises. Students of anthropology, peace and conflict studies should also be introduced to courses on the protection of cultural properties in situations of armed conflict. The third recommendation is to countries that have not signed relevant UNESCO Conventions on the protection and promotion of cultural properties. They need to do so immediately in order to enjoy the kind of international support and goodwill that Mali enjoyed in its moment of trial.

References

Varoutsikos, B. (2013). Update: Mali’s cultural heritage in danger, Saving Antiquities for Everyone (SAFE), http://www.savingantiquities.org/update-malis-cultural-heritage-in-danger/, retrieved October 7.

UNESCO (2013). Mali http://whc.unesco.org/en/statesparties/ml/, retrieved October 7.

Key Recommendations

1. More resources should be committed to digitising the kinds of exotic manuscripts destroyed in Mali.

2. Security academies should now have courses on how to recognise and protect exotic cultural properties.

3. Efforts should be stepped up at the country level on the gathering of actionable intelligence on possible future threats to the safety of cultural properties.

4. Students of anthropology, peace and conflict studies should be introduced to courses on the protection of cultural properties in situations of armed conflict.

Commendation

1. UNESCO is commended for the early action in listing the cultural properties in Mali as a World Heritage in Danger and in mobilising resources to provide logistic and financial support for some of the repair efforts to the damage inflicted on the properties.

2. The United Nations Security Council has set a good example by adopting its Resolution 2100 on April 25, 2013 which established a peacekeeping force for Mali with a mandate to include “Support for cultural preservation” (Section 16f of the UN Resolution).

CULTURAL SECURITY IN MALI: SOME LESSONS AND POLICY OPTIONS 7

Institute for African Culture And International Understanding Olusegun Obasanjo Presidential Library

About the Institute

The Institute for African Culture and International Understanding, a UNESCO Category 2 Institute of the Olusegun Obasanjo Presidential Library (OOPL), Abeokuta, Ogun State was approved by the Executive Board of UNESCO in October 2008 and formally commissioned at its OOPL site on January 9, 2009 by Koichiro Matsuura, the immediate-past Director-General of UNESCO. The Governing Board of the Centre chaired by HE Dr. Christopher Kolade, was inaugurated on March 4, 2009.

Vision

The vision of the Institute is “to increase inter-cultural dialogue and international understanding between Africa and other civilisations”.

Mission

The mission of the institute is to preserve Africa’s cultural heritage, promote and strengthen renaissance in African cultures both at the regional and international levels.

Aims of the InstituteThe institute aims at:

• raising awareness among stakeholders at the national, regional and international levels about the important role played by cultural diversity and its corollary, intercultural dialogue, for social cohesion in pluralistic societies;

• facilitating the network of sister institutions working in these fields and inducing relevant academic and scientific studies;

• providing a platform of genuine cooperation for specialists in African culture;• providing capacity-building through the promotion of knowledge-sharing underlying values in order to

strengthen harmonious coexistence; and• highlighting the values of diversity and dialogue by studying tangible and intangible heritage as well

as contemporary cultural expressions in the African region and the Diaspora (through inventories and catalogues, including in digitised form, disseminating and exhibiting collections and other relevant materials).

AcknowledgementGrateful thanks are extended to UNESCO Bamako Office for its contribution towards the finalisation of this Policy Brief and for providing some of the pictures. We thank two anonymous reviewers of the draft whose suggestions led to the refinement of the Brief.

Policy Brief CoordinatorProfessor Isaac Albert (Associate Expert)

Initiator of Policy Brief No. 1Professor Isaac Albert (Associate Expert)

Editor-in-ChiefProfessor Peter A. Okebukola

CULTURAL SECURITY IN MALI: SOME LESSONS AND POLICY OPTIONS 8

Institute for African Culture And International Understanding Olusegun Obasanjo Presidential Library

Governing Board of the Institute

Chairman: His Excellency Dr. Christopher Kolade

Members: Ambassador Dr. Mary M. Khimulu, Ambassador Denise Houphouet-Boigny, Ambassador Mohamed Sameh Amr, Ambassador Dolana Msimang, Professor Hassana Alidou, (Director, UNESCO Regional Multisectoral Office for West Africa in Abuja); Mr. George Ufot (Representative of the Permanent Secretary Federal Ministry of Culture, Tourism and National Orientation), Magdalene Anene- Maidoh, Secretary-General, NATCOM-UNESCO, Professor Peter A. Okebukola; Sultan of Sokoto Muhammad Sa’ad Abubakar III, Prof. Oye Ibidapo-Obe.

SecretariatProfessor Peter A. Okebukola (Director), Omotayo Ikotun, Vitalis Ortese, Damian Oyibo, Oladiran Olaniyi, Ibukun Olagbemiro, Akintayo Peters, Tunde Sobola, Femi Jenrola Adebayo.

Associate Experts and Experts GroupProfessor Isaac Albert, Moji Ladipo, Ayo Tella, Professor Gbenga Ogunmoyela, Professor Wole Ogundele, Dr. Anthony Onwumah

Editorial BoardInstitute for African Culture and International UnderstandingOlusegun Obasanjo Presidential LibraryOke-mosan, Abeokuta, Nigeria

Tel: +2348022904423; +2348023400030; +23439290761Website: www.iaciu-oopl.org

About the Olusegun Obasanjo Presidential Library

The Olusegun Obasanjo Presidential Library, the first of its kind in Africa, is located on an expansive 32-hectare land in the historic town of Abeokuta, Nigeria. It has as mission: “To foster understanding of the life, career and Presidential administration of Olusegun Obasanjo and through this exposition, promote the ideals of democracy, good governance and leadership; facilitate critical reflection on best practices in public service; and provide a clearer comprehension of developments in Nigeria, Africa, the Commonwealth and the rest of the world.” It has as its focus the Presidential Library centre and museum, around which are built academic units with the core mission of promoting human security in Africa, an international conference centre, amusement, recreational and accommodation areas as well as other support facilities. It is designed to encourage patronage from international scholars, conference organisers, as well as attract global tourism. Besides enhancing the socio-economic life of its immediate location, its presence represents a positive contribution towards the international image of Nigeria and of Africa and as an evergreen resource for inspiring the ideals of democracy and good governance.

Board of Trustees of the Olusegun Obasanjo Presidential Library

Co-Chair: H.E. Dr. Christopher Kolade and Hon Carl MastersChief Promoter: His Excellency Chief Olusegun Obasanjo, GCFRMembers: Alhaji Ahmed Joda, Professor Akinlawon Mabogunje, Chief Olatunde Abudu, Dr. Onaolapo Soleye, Dr. Iyabo Obasanjo-Bello, Chief Obafemi Olopade, Chief (Mrs) Chinyere Asika.

©Institute for African Culture and International Understanding, OOPL, Abeokuta