The track leading to Al Bayda's forgotten Temple of Aesculapius is shingled with rocks and rubbish. Sheep doze beneath juniper trees, graffiti tags blight nearby buildings and, in the distance, the ample family home of Safia Farkash, wife of Libyan leader Moamer Qadhafi, spills over the hillside.
The remains of the Temple of Aesculapius, a medical school that dates back to 4BC, is one of eastern Libya's cultural treasures and one of the heritage sites threatened by the ongoing conflict. Earlier, it was a lack of state funding to the Department in Antiquities, that cast doubt on the preservation of the site with its white marble columns, topped with carvings of the ancient wonder-drug Silphium.
The United Nations Educational, Cultural and Scientific Organisation (UNESCO) says the Libya government and allied forces implementing the no-fly zone must respect the rich cultural sites. The organisation has urged all sides to keep military operations away from heritage sites. "We're asking coalition forces and the Libyan government to keep operations away from important cultural sites," said Lucia Iglesias, press officer for UNESCO.
"We did the same in Iraq when the conflict began there," she said. Libya's vast, scarcely-visited portfolio of archaeological and cultural remains includes the ancient Roman city of Leptis Magna, a UNESCO World Heritage Site 130 kilometres east of Tripoli. The ancient city's marketplace, amphitheatre, baths and even its ancient toilet facilities remain largely intact.
UNESCO is concerned about Leptis Magna anf our other sites on its World Heritage List, including the Phoenician trading post at Sabratha, the old desert town of Ghadames - under government control - and the ancient Greek and Roman remains of Cyrene.
On the border of Algeria at Tassili N'Ajjer, the rock art site of Tadrart Acacus is also a concern. Here, ancient cave paintings are believed to depict life in the Sahara as early as 12,000 BC. Some 185 kilometres east of Benghazi, Cyrene's monuments and temples sit atop a steep, impressive hillside that spills like bougainvillea over the Mediterranean.
During the 4th century BC it was the world's most important Hellenic city; a cultural centre frequented by contemporaries of Socrates and home to Aristippus, one of the founders of the early school of hedonism. Until recently, the site attracted small numbers of tourists who came to take advantage of the lack of crowds and watch the ongoing excavation effort.
Mohamed Fes, a tour guide at Cyrene, said tourist numbers were increasing until recently. "We were hoping that the increasing number of tourists would mean more funding to keep Libya's sites in good condition," he said. "That is now at risk." Inside the museum, ancient busts and sculptures of Marcus Aurelius and Jupiter are locked away.
In the shadow of Cyrene, a tight mountain road winds down to Apollonia, the former port of the ancient city. Marble columns gleam in the sunshine and the wind whistles through the remains of former churches, olive presses and two amphitheatres. But the tour groups no longer come, and the lively Al-Manara Hotel, which looks out over the ancient harbour, has closed its doors.
Tourism has become another casualty of the conflict. Archaeological excavations planned for 2011 by universities in Italy and Poland have been put on hold, and funds will not be diverted to the Department of Antiquities as long as the unrest goes on.
"UNESCO is trying to do what we can during this time," said Jan Hlavik, Programme Specialist in UNESCO's Museums and Culture diAP "We are trying to reduce the risk to these sites and others in Libya and have sent information to coalition states urging them to take cultural sites into account during military planning," he said.
Eight of the 10 coalition states are subject to the 1954 Hague Convention for the Protection of Cultural Property in the Event of Armed Conflict. The convention ensures that monuments of architecture, history and art are preserved during wartime. But Britain and the United Arab Emirates are not governed by the convention. "The United Kingdom and the United Arab Emirates must therefore comply with international humanitarian law rules," said Hlavik. "One of those is to respect cultural property, not to target it and not to use it for military purposes."
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