Taliban Shows Off Buddha Rubble

Taliban soldiers Monday displayed the yawning alcoves where two soaring Buddha statues once stood, allowing foreigners a first glimpse of the sandstone rubble that is all that remains of the ancient wonders.

The larger Buddha, once 175 feet tall, was a blasted heap of stone. The other figure, 120 feet tall, was also gone--except for a few stone folds of its robe.

Gazing down from a dusty plateau overlooking the mountain monuments of Bamian, the heavily armed soldiers seemed amused by their visitors’ interest and starved for company after months of fighting in the remote area about 80 miles northwest of Kabul, the capital.

They said they were only following the orders of the Taliban regime, which last month declared all statues idolatrous and ordered their destruction.

“Step by step, we blew them up,” soldier Abdul Raouf said matter-of-factly of the 3rd and 5th century statues. “First we blew off the leg of the big one, and then we went to the smaller one and blew it up. It took us four days to finish the big statue. He was very strong.”

Spent artillery shells, lined up like sentries, stood at the base of the mountain alcove where the taller statue once stood.

Stairs near the site of the shorter Buddha led to dusty rooms, their walls decorated with empty niches where smaller statues once stood.

Residents of Bamian considered the monuments neighbors. They called the taller one “Solsol,” meaning year after year. They believed the other one was a woman and called her “Shahmama,” or king mother.

On Monday, the Taliban flew about 20 foreign journalists aboard an aging, Russian-made propeller plane from Kabul to Bamian in central Afghanistan.

Taliban soldiers armed with rocket launchers and heavy machine guns then took the reporters--the first foreigners known to have visited the area since the destruction--to a plateau overlooking the site of the statues.

Even Islamic countries--including the Taliban’s closest ally, Pakistan--pleaded for the statues to be spared.

Faiz Ahmed Faiz, chief of the Foreign Ministry’s press department, told reporters that the destruction was not intended to offend any religious group.

“This decision was not against anyone. It was totally a domestic matter of Afghanistan,” Faiz said. “We are very disappointed that the international community doesn’t care about the suffering people but they are shouting about the stone statues of Buddha.”

The scars of war were visible in the town itself. Camouflaged tanks sat beside homes ruined by fighting. Anti-aircraft weapons were mounted on the roof of one building.

The Taliban imposes a strict interpretation of Islam over the 95% of Afghanistan it controls.

Taliban soldiers have been waging a battle for Bamian against their northern-based opponents. They initially captured the area in 1997; since then, international organizations have been worried about the fate of the Buddhas.

Reports as early as 1998 said Taliban troops had attacked the smaller statue, using mortars to blast its groin, arm and head. Ancient frescoes in the niches above the larger Buddha were also lost.