Archaeologists seek better site protection

Archaeologists have called on Mekong Delta provinces to take effective measures to preserve the sites and artefacts of the ancient Oc Eo culture, one of Viet Nam’s earliest known civilisations.
"[The system of] each province having its own policy to preserve relics has shown many shortcomings," Dr Pham Duc Manh of the HCM City National University, said while speaking at a seminar held in Long Xuyen town last week by the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism’s Heritage Department and An Giang Province People’s Committee on preservation of the Oc Eo culture.
Manh and many other archaeologists called for a comprehensive policy and proper investment to preserve Oc Eo sites and relics.
Participants also raised the alarm about the large number of Oc Eo artefacts being sold to antique collectors.
"Work must be done quickly to build an Oc Eo Culture Museum in a southern province," HCM City-based culture researcher Dr Nguyen Quoc Hung said.
Most reports at the seminar that attracted 180 archaeologists and cultural researchers from around the country focused on ways to preserve the Oc Eo culture which flourished in southern Viet Nam in the second and third centuries.
Following Frenchman Louis Malleret’s first excavations in An Giang Province’s Thoai Son District in 1944, foreign and Vietnamese archaeologists have discovered more than 100 sites in almost every Delta province and in Dong Nai east of HCM City.
"Tens of thousands of artefacts including baked earthenware, stone items, statues, and reliefs of Buddhist and Hindu gods that illustrate the ancient religious traditions of the southern region were unearthed at Oc Eo sites in the last 65 years," Ngo Quang Lang, director of An Giang’s Department of Culture, Sports and Tourism, said.
Local authorities need to adopt proper techniques to protect these artefacts from damage caused by weather and age, he added.