[Congressional Bills 108th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H.R. 4641 Introduced in House (IH)]






108th CONGRESS
  2d Session
                                H. R. 4641

     To authorize the President to take certain actions to protect 
        archaeological or ethnological materials of Afghanistan.


_______________________________________________________________________


                    IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                             June 22, 2004

 Mr. English (for himself, Mr. Holden, Mr. Van Hollen, Mr. McDermott, 
 Mrs. Maloney, Ms. Hart, Mr. Weldon of Pennsylvania, Mr. McGovern, and 
Mr. Grijalva) introduced the following bill; which was referred to the 
                      Committee on Ways and Means

_______________________________________________________________________

                                 A BILL


 
     To authorize the President to take certain actions to protect 
        archaeological or ethnological materials of Afghanistan.

    Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the 
United States of America in Congress assembled,

SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

    This Act may be cited as the ``Cultural Conservation of the 
Crossroads of Civilization Act''.

SEC. 2. FINDINGS.

    The Congress finds as follows:
            (1) Afghanistan has been at the crossroads of 
        civilizations, a mosaic of ethnic and linguistic culture, and a 
        major contributor to the world community for more than two 
        millennia.
            (2) Afghanistan, flanked by Central, West, and South Asia, 
        has seen waves of migrating peoples pass through what has been 
        referred to as the roundabout of the ancient world.
            (3) Archaeologists have identified evidence of Stone Age 
        technology and a 20,000-year-old sculpture head in Aq Kupruk.
            (4) The earliest settlers in Afghanistan, who migrated from 
        northern territories approximately 50,000 years ago, lived as 
        individual hunters in the caves of the northern Hindu Kush 
        mountains.
            (5) Evidence has been uncovered at the foothills of the 
        Hindu Kush Mountains and Darra-e Dadil (near Darra-e Suf), 
        Hazara Sum (near Aibak), and Qara Kamar (near Khulm) indicating 
        that North Afghanistan was home to the earliest domestic plants 
        and animals.
            (6) The Khyber Pass, a 33-mile passage through the Hindu 
        Kush mountain range and dating back to 326 B.C., connects the 
        northern frontier of Pakistan with Afghanistan.
            (7) During the period from 336 to 323 B.C., Alexander the 
        Great defeated Duriush III, the last Kakhamanesh ruler, took 
        control of Afghanistan, and introduced new coins and artistic 
        styles to the region.
            (8) Alexander the Great and his army marched through the 
        Khyber Pass to reach the plains of India, Aryans passed through 
        on their victorious advance of Persian and Greek armies, and 
        Scythians, White Huns, Seljuks, Tartars, Mongols, Sassanians, 
        Turks, Mughals, and Durranis made successive inroads into the 
        territories beyond Peshawar Valley and Indus via the Khyber 
        Pass.
            (9) Graeco-Buddhist Gandharan culture reached its height 
        during Afghanistan's Kushan Empire under King Kanishka.
            (10) During the Kushan Empire, Buddha was first given a 
        human face, and the world's largest Buddhas ranging from 120 to 
        175 feet tall were carved into the cliff at Bamiyan.
            (11) The Silk Road passed through Afghanistan, bringing 
        Roman glass and Chinese ceramics.
            (12) In 962, the rise of the Ghaznavid Dynasty ushered in 
        the Islamic era and gave Afghanistan a permanent political and 
        cultural role in Islamic civilization.
            (13) In 1219, Changiz (Genghis) Khan invaded Bukhara to 
        avenge the looting of his caravan. Changiz eventually defeated 
        Khwarazn Shah and proceeded through Afghanistan in his conquest 
        of Asia.
            (14) Most archaeological material excavated in Afghanistan 
        during the 20th century was housed in the National Museum in 
        Kabul or in regional museums.
            (15) Reports indicate that copies of ancient maps are being 
        used by looters to track long lost villages in the eastern 
        provinces of Nangarhar, Laghman, and Kunar.
            (16) The Archaeological Institute of America has published 
        articles listing thousands of artifacts that are among the 
        stolen or imperiled treasures of the National Museum in Kabul.
            (17) The nation of Afghanistan has endured a raping and 
        pillage of its cultural property over the past two decades, 
        leading Abdul Wasey Feroozi, director of the National 
        Archaeological Institute in Kabul, to state, ``The catastrophe 
        of war annihilated seventy years of our hard work and 
        accomplishments. In the period from 1992 to 1994 . . . over 70 
        percent of the Kabul National Museum was burned and damaged and 
        100 percent of the objects were stolen or vandalized. Illegal 
        excavations and extensive clandestine digging started at most 
        historical sites, and thousands of valuable objects were 
        transported to other countries, notably through Pakistan, to 
        the international markets.''.
            (18) It should be recognized that the cultural heritage of 
        Afghanistan is at extreme peril and this legislation is a 
        result of a profound concern for the damage to Afghan 
        antiquities, sites, monuments, and cultural institutions.

SEC. 3. EMERGENCY IMPLEMENTATION OF IMPORT RESTRICTIONS.

    (a) Authority.--The President may exercise the authority the 
President has under section 304 of the Convention on Cultural Property 
Implementation Act (19 U.S.C. 2603) with respect to any archaeological 
or ethnological material of Afghanistan as if Afghanistan were a State 
Party under that Act, except that, in exercising such authority, 
subsection (c) of such section shall not apply.
    (b) Definition.--In this section, the term ``archaeological or 
ethnological material of Afghanistan'' means cultural property of 
Afghanistan and other items of archaeological, historical, cultural, 
rare scientific, or religious importance illegally removed, after the 
date of the enactment of this Act, from the National Museum in Kabul or 
other locations, including archaeological sites, in Afghanistan.

SEC. 4. TERMINATION OF AUTHORITY.

    The authority of the President under section 3 shall terminate upon 
the earlier of--
            (1) the date that is 5 years after the date on which the 
        President certifies to the Congress that normalization of 
        relations between the United States and the Government of 
        Afghanistan has been established; or
            (2) September 30, 2009.
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