Palmyra treasures vandalised by Isil to be pieced together

SYRIAN archaeologists have begun work restoring artefacts damaged by Isil during the time the jihadist group controlled the ancient city of Palmyra.

Eight experts are attempting to reconstruct statues and sculptures recovered from the Unesco heritage site, with the help of specialists from the Pushkin Museum in Moscow.

The Syrian government lost Palmyra when it was overrun by Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (Isil) militants who took sledgehammers and explosives to the 2nd-century BC Temple of Baalshamin and the limestone lions guarding Al-lāt. The army recaptured it in March 2016, but lost it again briefly, only to reclaim it finally in March 2017.

The city’s museum suffered considerable damage: statues and sarcophagi had been smashed, while busts had been beheaded.

“The work is very complicated; the terrorists have broken the sculptures into many pieces,” said Maher al-jubari, the director of the laboratory of national museums in Syria. “My task is to glue them together with a special solution.”