Cambodia's temples fell to looters

New research has uncovered the criminal system that enabled a ring of army officials to smuggle tens of thousands of antiquities out of Cambodia during the country's years of unrest between 1970 and 1998.

these days, many of Cambodia's ancient Angkorian temples are denuded. Pedestals supporting the feet of statues whose bodies have been cleaved off, and walls are pockmarked with holes where reliefs once stood.

But while the temples have been standing for hundreds of years, much of that looting took place over the course of just three decades thanks to a highly organized criminal ring involving army officials on both sides of the border, research published this month in the British Journal of Criminology has found.

An unprecedented case study of an antiquities trafficking network, the paper by criminologist Simon Mackenzie and cultural heritage lawyer Tess Davis – both of the University of Glasgow – details the ordered system that allowed tens of thousands of antiquities to leave the country during the years of unrest between 1970 and 1998.

In Banteay Chhmar, "local villagers were 'invited' (in the sense of 'instructed') to loot the temple at night by these various armed factions, who effectively functioned as gangmasters for this looting enterprise," note the authors.

Paid the equivalent of USD 12 a day, the workers "faced violent intimidation and possibly death if they refused."

The setup, as recounted by former looters, was replicated at six major archaeological sites across the country where the researchers carried out interviews.