By Fiona Hyslop

The third International Culture Summit took place at the Scottish Parliament last week, welcoming more than 40 countries, coming together to discuss the vital role culture plays in the life of any successful community.

The event offered a diverse range of speakers, from Youssou N’Dour to Professor Maamoun Abdulkarim, as well as countless thought-provoking ideas and contributions.

Professor Abdulkarim is Director-General of Antiquities and Museums in Syria. He spoke passionately about the irrevocable damage to world heritage sites. While Scotland’s historic, vibrant capital provided a fitting backdrop for three days of inspiring and engaging discussion, it was also a poignant reminder of the importance of preserving our cultural heritage.

Professor Abdulkarim told delegates of the appalling destruction of priceless monuments in many parts of Syria, and the efforts of his team to conceal important collections. His lecture Heritage and Conflict: Syria’s Battle To Protect Its Past gave details of the sites, along with ancient landmarks that have been damaged or destroyed in conflict from mausoleums in Timbuktu to ancient monuments in Palmyra and the Bamiyan Buddha statues in Afghanistan.

Culture and heritage are global treasures, belonging to all humanity. The actions of the International Criminal Court (ICC) in bringing to justice those who led the destruction of the Timbuktu mausoleums underline the resolve of the international community to protect our heritage. The ICC ruling sent an important message to those who see culture and heritage as targets. The Scottish Government supports the UK’s bill ratifying the Hague Convention on protection of cultural property in areas of conflict, which is why we have asked the Scottish Parliament to agree to the convention being applied in Scotland.

There is a strong tradition of valuing cultural heritage in Scotland, not least through protective legislation in place since the late 19th century to help secure significant historic sites and buildings for future generations. In addition to six world heritage sites, Scotland has more than 47,000 listed buildings, more than 8,000 scheduled monuments, 40 inventory battlefields and seven historic marine protected areas. Our historic environment is a valuable cultural, social and economic asset.

Looking to future protection of our heritage, and on a wider scale, our museum and heritage organisations have valued expertise in archaeology, conservation and digital documentation that can help support and protect culture and heritage in areas at risk through conflict.

The Scottish Ten, a partnership between Historic Environment Scotland and the Glasgow School of Art’s digital design studio wants to position Scotland as a world leader in visualising the historic environment. Already, it has demonstrated the huge potential of new technologies to both document and virtually reconstruct historic sites across the world.

The project is helping conserve and manage Scotland’s world heritage sites and five international heritage sites: New Lanark; Orkney; St Kilda; Edinburgh; the Antonine Wall; Mount Rushmore; the Rani ki Vav stepwell in India; Eastern Qing Tombs in China; Sydney Opera House and Nagasaki. The same process can be applied to other locations, particularly if they are damaged or endangered.

Digital survey and visualisation can provide a vital resource for technical conservation and subsequent monitoring but can also be used to virtually restore what has been damaged. Where resources and conditions permit, it may also be used to help re-build damaged buildings and monuments. Using digital tools means records can be created rapidly and in immense detail, compared with timescales required by traditional survey.

The Scottish Ten has demonstrated that digital records are both desirable and sensible, especially where there is an anticipated threat by natural or malicious means. When teamed with historic files, the combination of traditional and digital records is immensely powerful. It is my hope that the techniques honed by the Scottish Ten can be applied internationally, not just to create interesting snapshots in time but also to build reference documents vital to the international preservation of cultural heritage.

As we face the threat of being taken out of the EU, the coming together of so many nations, cultures, personalities, backgrounds and aspirations with the common aim to enhance, protect and celebrate our respective cultures was as inspiring as it was poignant. The lasting message, for me, from the Culture Summit 2016 is that we have to be brave when it comes to culture: through international cooperation, culture can provide the ties that bind us.