The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (Unesco), along with several cultural organisations including the Museums Association, has written to the government urging it to ratify the 1954 Hague Convention for the Protection of Cultural Property in the Event of Armed Conflict.
The UK signed the convention in 1954, but never ratified it. The Draft (Armed Conflicts) Bill, which would enable ratification, was tabled in 2008, but no parliamentary time was found to legislate it.
The letter asks the government to put the bill before parliament in acknowledgement of its responsibilities to international security. The issue came to prominence in 2003 when the Iraq war led to a catastrophic loss of cultural property.
