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| Southeast Asia | |
| Police seize long lost Islamic treasures of the Java Sea | |
| 2006-05-22 | |
| Unique historical treasures worth tens of millions of pounds were yesterday gathering dust in store rooms in Jakarta after being impounded by police. The 250,000 pieces of Chinese ceramics and Arabic and Persian glassware were recovered from a 1,000-year-old wreck in the Java Sea off Indonesia. Found with them were 13,000 Indian pearls, jewellery, about 1,000 rubies and sapphires and several gold pieces. They were salvaged from a ship that could rewrite the history of Islam in the world's most populous Muslim country. But police tape blocks access to a riding centre in Pamulang, Jakarta, where the treasure was being kept, and the French and German chief divers have spent a month in jail. The 18-month joint European and Indonesian operation on the vessel, 90 miles off the port of Cirebon, included an archaeological survey, with permits from all relevant ministries, and an agreement to share the proceeds 50-50 with the authorities. But after a rival salvage company filed a complaint that the team was not properly licensed the police stepped in and sealed everything. The wreck, which has no name but was made of tropical hardwood to a Malay design and is bigger than the vessels in which Columbus crossed the Atlantic five centuries later, went down in a storm within a decade of 970 AD. Chinese ceramics on board date from the Five Dynasties period, a short interval between the Tang and Song dynasties. Among them are Islamic rosary beads and a mould to mass-produce small metal tags, with three of the 99 Arabic names for God. But the wreck predates the earliest proof of Islam in the Malay archipelago - a sultan's tombstone in northern Sumatra - by almost 300 years. The implication is that instead of being spread across the Indian Ocean by Arab traders, as previously thought, the religion of Mohammed could have been brought to what is now the world's most populous Muslim nation from China, where there was already a Muslim presence.
Horst Liebner, who was studying the finds until the police inquiry, said: "It gives us knowledge we never had before. Why would you trade Islamic goods to a Hindu and Buddhist society? No one would want to buy them. It was to be given out. These were people going around with Islamic ideas which they wanted to spread." The divers on the project, Jean-Paul Blancan, 53, and Fred Dobberphul, 43, were released from prison only following diplomatic pressure. Mr Blancan contracted typhoid and dengue fever while in jail, but "the most frustrating thing was being there and being innocent". Mr Dobberphul added: "We try our best for this country. It was the first legal project ever, following all the regulations, without stealing, without bribing." | |
| Posted by:ryuge |
| #7 Horst Liebner, who was studying the finds until the police inquiry, said: "It gives us knowledge we never had before. Why would you trade Islamic goods to a Hindu and Buddhist society? No one would want to buy them. It was to be given out. These were people going around with Islamic ideas which they wanted to spread." Yes. A boatload of islamonuts with enough money and brainwashing and violence to subdue y'all. The pestilence sure came well-funded. Origins that important? |
| Posted by: Thinemp Whimble2412 2006-05-22 12:37 |
| #6 Looks like he got his big lesson in how the rest of the planet operates. |
| Posted by: bk 2006-05-22 11:57 |
| #5 You need the wall sized matrix of last name and position in gov to choose the proper bribe. Without it if you are lucky you just go to jail like these bozos. |
| Posted by: 3dc 2006-05-22 11:07 |
| #4 Let this be a lesson to you all on doing business with the dirty Indos. |
| Posted by: anon1 2006-05-22 09:27 |
| #3 following all the regulations, without stealing, without bribing. That was your mistake. |
| Posted by: phil_b 2006-05-22 02:51 |
| #2 "It was the first legal project ever, following all the regulations, without stealing, without bribing." I think I see the problem, Mr Dobberphul. |
| Posted by: random styling 2006-05-22 02:36 |
| #1 "...without stealing, without bribing." Until now... |
| Posted by: PBMcL 2006-05-22 02:31 |