Delegate aims to rebuild Buddha statues

One delegate to Loya Jirga, happy that the tribal assembly has finally got under way, has a pet project in the back of his mind – rebuilding one of the two Bamiyan Buddha statues blown up by the Taliban last year.

The destruction of the statues, hewn into a limestone cliff in the central province of Bamiyan nearly 2,000 years ago, sparked international condemnation.

Amanullah Haiderzad, a professor of fine arts at Kabul University, said the Taliban just wanted to destroy Afghanistan's heritage.

"It was nothing to do with religion," he said near the site of the Loya Jirga. "They were so stupid."

He reckons it would take five years to build one of the Buddhas, making bricks from the original rock, creating hundreds of jobs and bringing in the tourists.

Where would the money come from? "We will find it," he said.