标签： Asia

As armed conflict continues to roil the Middle East, a growing international outcry has emerged over the irreversible damage inflicted on centuries of cultural heritage, with at least 131 historical sites in Iran already harmed by joint US-Israeli strikes and escalating threats to culturally significant landmarks across Lebanon amid ongoing Israeli bombardment. Experts warn that this destruction goes far beyond what is commonly accepted as unavoidable collateral damage of war, representing a deliberate erasure of shared human history.

Neda Zoghi, an Iranian artist and civilization scholar with a doctorate in Islamic art who currently serves as a researcher at the Asia West East Centre based in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, argues that the scale of destruction points to a coordinated attack on the identity of regional civilizations. “When over 100 cultural heritage sites and museums sustain deliberate or negligent destruction in a matter of weeks, we are confronting something far more calculated — the systematic dismantling of a civilization’s physical memory,” Zoghi explained in comments on the escalating crisis.

Per a Friday report from Xinhua News Agency, Seyed Reza Salehi-Amiri, Iran’s Minister of Cultural Heritage, Tourism, and Handicrafts, confirmed that the damage spans 20 of Iran’s provinces, with 131 irreplaceable historical and civilization-related monuments sustaining harm from the strikes. Photographic evidence released in early April captured the devastating impact: visitors walking through the fire-scarred, structurally damaged interiors of Tehran’s iconic Golestan Palace, a UNESCO World Heritage Site and one of Iran’s most recognizable cultural landmarks, serve as a stark visual testament to the destruction.

As strikes continue, concerns are also mounting that Lebanon’s rich array of cultural and historical properties face the same fate. The country’s millennia-long history has left it with thousands of archaeological sites, historic city centers, and heritage landmarks, many of which already sit in active conflict zones along the Lebanon-Israel border. Cultural heritage advocates warn that without urgent intervention to protect these sites, the region could lose irreplaceable pieces of global cultural history that have survived centuries of conflict and change.

The destruction of cultural heritage during armed conflict is widely recognized as a violation of international humanitarian law, which explicitly prohibits deliberate attacks on historic monuments and cultural sites unless they are repurposed for military use. The scale of damage reported in Iran has drawn growing condemnation from cultural organizations across the globe, with many calling for an immediate halt to strikes that target or put at risk sites of cultural significance.

In a landmark decision that human rights advocates call an unprecedented shift in Central Asian geopolitical alignment, a Kazakh court has convicted 19 ethnic Kazakh activists who staged a protest against China’s long-running crackdown in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region in late 2023. The ruling marks the harshest crackdown to date on voices critical of Chinese policy in the neighboring country, according to regional experts and rights watchdogs.

The November 2023 demonstration, held near Kazakhstan’s border with China, saw the activists call for the release of a Kazakh citizen detained by Chinese authorities in Xinjiang. During the protest, participants burned Chinese national flags and portraits of Chinese leader Xi Jinping, actions that Beijing later decried as a deliberate provocation. All 19 individuals convicted are citizens of Kazakhstan.

Court documents and local media reports confirm the sentencing: 11 of the activists received five-year prison terms on charges of “inciting discord,” while the remaining eight were handed down suspended sentences with strict movement restrictions. Shinquat Baizhan, the legal representative for the convicted group, has publicly verified these details.

Background to the verdict stretches back to 2017, when the Chinese government launched a sweeping security campaign in Xinjiang that interned more than one million Uyghurs, Kazakhs and other Muslim-majority ethnic minority groups in mass detention camps and prisons. While Beijing claims the campaign targeted extremism and has since wound down large-scale detentions, the region remains under heavy authoritarian control, with severe constraints on religious practice, cultural expression and cross-border movement. More than one million ethnic Kazakhs reside in Xinjiang, with thousands detained and countless others separated from family members across the border in Kazakhstan.

For Kazakhstan, a Central Asian nation of 19 million people that counts China as its largest trading and investment partner, Xinjiang policy has long been a sensitive diplomatic issue. Yalkun Uluyol, a China researcher with Human Rights Watch, explained that Kazakh authorities launched criminal probes into the protesters only after receiving a formal diplomatic protest from the Chinese consulate in Almaty, Kazakhstan’s largest commercial city. The Associated Press obtained and reviewed the diplomatic note, in which Beijing called the demonstration “an open provocation against the national dignity of the People’s Republic of China and an insult to the Chinese Communist Party and the Chinese people.”

When contacted for comment on the verdict, China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs framed the proceedings as an exclusive internal matter for Kazakhstan, adding that the country is a “friendly neighbor” that “understands China’s position on Xinjiang governance.” Kazakhstan’s foreign ministry declined to provide any comment on the case.

The convicted protesters are all affiliated with Atajurt, a grassroots human rights organization that advocates for ethnic Kazakhs affected by repression in Xinjiang. The group has long operated under pressure in Kazakhstan, an authoritarian state that has little tolerance for domestic dissent. In 2019, authorities arrested Atajurt founder Serikzhan Bilash, forcing him into exile after he signed an agreement pledging to end all political activity. Until recently, however, the Kazakh government allowed limited Atajurt operations, acknowledging widespread public sympathy in the country for ethnic Kazakhs suffering persecution across the border.

That quiet tolerance has now evaporated, Uluyol said, as Kazakhstan deepens its economic and political ties to Beijing. “This is unprecedented. It signals that Kazakhstan is willing to sacrifice freedom of its people to maintain good relations with Beijing,” he noted. Prior to this ruling, individual activists speaking out on Xinjiang had faced pressure, but rights groups confirm this is the first time such a large group of activists has been given prison sentences for their advocacy.

Exiled Atajurt founder Bilash, now residing in the United States, warned the convictions will have far-reaching consequences for human rights documentation and support in Xinjiang. For years, the group has provided financial aid to families of detained ethnic Kazakhs, submitted testimonial evidence to the United Nations and foreign embassies, and collected hundreds of first-hand accounts from people searching for missing relatives detained in China.

“The world will lose more than just a human rights organization; it will lose the biggest window into the humanitarian disaster in neighboring Xinjiang,” Bilash said.

Ahead of the 2026 Tengchong Mt Gaoligong Ultra marathon held in Yunnan, Southwest China, 10 American runners and their family members made a meaningful stop that went far beyond pre-race preparation: a visit to a local war memorial honoring the Chinese People’s War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression (1931–1945). The trip offered the group a deeply personal look at the shared wartime history that binds China and the United States, a history too often overlooked in modern discourse.

The memorial, located in the strategic border city of Tengchong, centers its exhibits on two defining chapters of WWII history in the region: the campaigns of the Chinese Expeditionary Force, which fought to retake the vital China-Myanmar supply line from Japanese occupation, and the legacy of the Flying Tigers, the official American Volunteer Group that played a critical role in the Allied war effort in Asia. Formed in 1941, the Flying Tigers conducted dangerous supply runs along the treacherous “Hump” air route connecting India to China’s Kunming and Chongqing, delivering critical resources to Chinese and American ground forces fighting on the front lines.

For 80-year-old Bob Becker, whose father and uncle both served in World War II in the region, the visit was far more than a historical tour. Walking through the memorial’s halls, studying well-preserved flight suits, personal artifacts, and candid photographs of American airmen interacting with local Chinese civilians, as a guide detailed how Flying Tigers members fought side-by-side with Chinese troops and civilians, Becker was overcome with emotion. “It was very impressive and I got emotional. I felt a real connection because my father and my uncle both fought in World War II here,” he said. He added that he was deeply moved by the selfless spirit of all those who fought, their commitment to standing for justice, and their dedication to the greater good.

Becker shared a hopeful vision for future cross-cultural exchange, saying he hopes more Americans will travel to the site to experience these shared historical stories firsthand, and come away with a deeper understanding of the long-standing historic bond between the people of China and the United States.

Other participants echoed the meaning of the experience. Greg Pressler, another participating American runner, stressed that the visit reinforced why collective memory of war is so critical. “When we forget history, we are at risk of repeating it,” he noted. In an era of growing global instability, Pressler said hearing accounts of sacrifice from both Chinese people and foreign volunteers who came to China’s aid was incredibly moving. The memorial, he added, makes clear just how much can be achieved when people set aside their differences to stand with one another in need.

For endurance athlete David Green, the trip even renewed a sense of optimism. Learning the detailed history of how the two nations collaborated closely to defeat aggression offered a powerful example of what can be accomplished when nations work toward a common goal. “It renews my hope,” he said, “that people, even from different backgrounds, can unite together.”