Cultural heritage devastated
Print Edition
REDUCED to piles of rubble and splintered wood, Nepal’s rich cultural heritage has suffered a devastating blow from a massive earthquake that tore through the country, experts said yesterday.
In the heart of Kathmandu, many of a cluster of temples and statues built between the 12th and 18th centuries by the ancient kings of Nepal have collapsed, killing scores and trapping others.
The nine-story Dharahara tower, a major tourist attraction in the city’s Durbar square with its spiral staircase of 200 steps, was reduced to just its base when the 7.8-magnitude quake struck at lunchtime on Saturday.
“I had just bought tickets to climb the tower and was at its base when I felt a sudden shaking,” Dharmu Subedi, 36, said from a hospital bed in Kathmandu.
“Within minutes, the Dharahara had crumbled to the ground with maybe more than 100 people in it,” Subedi said.
UNESCO was trying to discover the extent of the destruction, including three palace-filled squares in the cities of Patan and Bhaktapur, as well as in Kathmandu.
“We understand the historic Durbar squares of Kathmandu, Patan and Bhaktapur have been badly damaged,” Christian Manhart, UNESCO’s representative to Nepal, said.
Manhart said his office was also trying to determine whether another UNESCO World Heritage site, that of Lumbini, the place where Buddha was born more than 2,600 years ago, had also been hit.
“We haven’t received reports of severe damage in Lumbini, but we are still trying to collect information,” he said of the site, some 280 kilometers west of Kathmandu.
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