Heritage under siege: military implementation of the 1954 Convention for the Protection of Cultural Property

Heritage under Siege is the result of a five year long multidisciplinary research focusing on military implementation of protecting and safeguarding Cultural Heritage in the event of conflict. The subject necessitated to involve legal obligations and implications. The main juridical framework in which cultural property protection (CPP) activities take place is the Convention for the Protection of Cultural Property in the Event of Armed Conflict to be referred to as The Hague Convention of 1954. Apart from literary sources, unpublished documents and interviews the account is for a large part based on field research or to be more precise participating observation. The author joined the Dutch Armed Forces to be able to execute research in theatre and was send out to several conflict areas. This resulted in new case studies from Iraq, Macedonia (FYROM) and Egypt as well cases from Afghanistan and Libya. Examples are not restricted to conflict areas but also comprise cases from exercises and preparations e.g. UK and the US