One of the great cultural tragedies of the Iraq war was the 2003 looting of the National Museum, which once housed one of the world’s most impressive Mesopotamian collections.

The United States was blamed by many for not doing more to stop the looting. Now, an American company, Google, is planning to digitize the museum’s collection and make it available online, for free, according to Google CEO Eric Schmidt, who made the announcement at the museum yesterday.
According to AFP, the costs of digitizing and electronically cataloging the artifacts will be paid for by Google and the State Department.

Jared Cohen, a State Department official in the policy planning group, organized the visit. According to a New York Times article:

“This is a really good example of what we’re calling 21st-century statecraft,” [Cohen] said. A dozen other companies are involved in the project to digitize the National Museum’s collections, so “it’s not an exclusive club,” he added.

Google’s effort is not the first to digitize the National Museum’s collection, but it is expected to be more extensive than the previous project:

What no one at the event mentioned was that the National Museum’s collections had already been digitized, at least in part, by Italy’s National Research Center, under a 1 million euro grant from the Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The collections went online last June as the Virtual Museum of Iraq.

Ms. Edan said that Web site, also made with the cooperation of the museum, was not extensive enough, and that the Italians did not do everything that Iraqi officials had asked. “This site is not sufficient,” she said, adding that she expected that Iraqi officials would have more control over the Google effort.

Massimo Cultraro, scientific director of the Virtual Museum, said in a telephone interview that the Web site was a collaboration among 100 scientists, computer technicians and historians. Google’s plans, he said, are to digitize as much as possible of the National Museum; it’s not as if they have to worry about storage space….

Mr. Cultraro said he welcomed the virtual competition. “My opinion is the cultural heritage of Iraq belongs to the whole world.”