Iraq - Feb 26

Islamic States militants have taken to destroying cultural relics in Mosul, Iraq. They are reported to have burnt the Mosul Library, which housed 8,000+ ancient works and they released a video of militants destroying statues. Some of the statues date back to 9^th century BCE. The Islamic State argues that the statues are of ‘false idols’ and should be destroyed for not representing pure Islam. Iraq is home to twelve thousand archaeological sites and the Islamic State now controls around one-sixth of them. Source: BBC News