From: dio1@cornell.edu
Date: Wed, 8 Feb 1995 15:06:36 -0400 (EDT)
Reply-To: dio1@cornell.edu
Subject: Fw: Necropolis find scotches Cairo road plan

     CAIRO (Reuter) - Egyptian archeologists have found an
ancient necropolis close to a half-built highway crossing the
Giza Pyramids plateau, probably ringing the death knell for a
project which has infuriated UNESCO.
         The Egyptian authorities sent in the archeologists to
excavate in November after UNESCO (the U.N. Educational
Scientific and Cultural Organization) complained the highway
violated a world cultural and natural heritage convention.
         President Hosni Mubarak has since ordered work on the
eight-lane road to stop while planners seek an alternative.
         Abdelhalim Noreddin, chairman of the Supreme Antiquities
Council, told Reuters Wednesday that preliminary excavations
just south of the highway had turned up at least eight tombs
dating probably from the six centuries before Christ.
         ``It looks like part of a big cemetery. We have a
necropolis, maybe from between the 26th Dynasty and the
Ptolemaic period,'' he said.
         The tombs contained some everyday objects, small coffins and
unusual small statues wrapped up as mummies, possibly connected
with the funerary gods Osiris and Sokar, he said.
         Other wooden statues found in the tombs, also very unusual,
have large erect phalluses but their purpose is not clear.
         One archeologist said he thought they were symbolic of
resurrection, another that they symbolized fertility.
         The necropolis stands on the plateau running between the
Giza pyramids in the north and the less well-known pyramids of
Dahshour about 17 miles to the south.
         The whole strip of desert is listed as a world heritage site
under the convention and in theory there are severe restrictions
on what can be built there.
         Said Zulficar, director of operational activities in the
cultural heritage division of UNESCO, visited the plateau in
November and was horrified to find work well advanced on the
highway, part of a ring road around Cairo.
         He also reported that the site contained a factory, rubbish
dumps, military installations and a new complex to house 15,000
people, all in violation of an Egyptian law passed in 1983 to
win world heritage status.
         A ministerial committee on alternatives to the highway met
in Cairo Sunday and Culture Minister Farouk Hosni was quoted as
saying highway planners would use a road which runs parallel to
the Nile and well outside the protected area.
         They may also build a road into the desert south of
Dahshour, also outside the area. This would link up, like the
disputed road, with highways to the provincial cities of
Alexandria and Fayoum.
         Noreddin said UNESCO would send some experts of its own to
study the possible routes and he declined to say what he thought
would be the fate of the half-built highway.
         ``I understand they are postponing a decision on the right
route until UNESCO comes,'' he said.
         In a resolution passed Dec. 17, UNESCO's World Heritage
Committee said the encroachments on the plateau seriously
threatened the integrity of the site and would do irreparable
damage if they continued.
         ``The committee requested the Egyptian authorities to take
the necessary measures to halt these different activities and to
repair the damage already caused without delay,'' it added.