March 10, 2021

Andrew Campbell 

Twenty years after being blasted in ruin by Taliban's explosives, one of Afghanistan’s pre-Islamic cultural heritage Buddha statues returned in virtual reality on the night of March 9 in the ancient sandstone carvings in Afghanistan's Bamiyan valley. The statue had been carved from the cliff in the highlands of Afghanistan measured at 55 meters (155 feet) high, once the world's tallest Buddhas, in the early 6th and 7th Centuries AD while Buddhism was once dominant in the region.

Following a daytime ceremony marking the destruction of the centuries-old statue in March 2001, on the night of March 9, the virtual form of a 3D projection was glowing in the rocky alcove where the statue once inhabited in central Afghanistan’s Bamiyan valley. It also represented a reflection on the Taliban's horrific occupation of Afghanistan and the holocaust of the country’s rich cultural heritage.

One of the event organizers of the "A night with Buddha" ceremony, Zahra Hussaini, expressed concern about the historical heritage in the future and the remaining artifacts to be freed from the rampage of extremist groups. Bamiyan has been one of Afghanistan’s popular tourist destinations and ideal for explorers in its archaeological heritage.

The statue represents one of many artifacts diminished in the course of the ideology and nuisance from the Taliban and others. Without US protection, many are afraid that the Taliban's return to the territory will once again put Afghanistan’s people and its cultural heritage in jeopardy in the coming months.

Photo:Webshot.