"The Case of the Mummy"
The Minister of Culture of Kyrgyzstan, Tugelbay Kazakov, who ordered the burial of the mummy from the State Museum, has been relieved of his position.
The corresponding decree was signed by the head of state, Almazbek Atambaev.
The agency was considered one of the passive ones due to the lack of state support and sufficient funding. However, this ministerial position changed its holders more than any other. Most often, they were people from the creative environment: playwright Sultan Raev, composer Ibragim Junusov, director Altynbek Maksutov, writer Tugelbay Sydykov. Almost all of them left amid various scandals.
The Security Council recommended that the government analyze the work of the Ministry of Culture.
Earlier, the Secretariat of the Security Council reported that 503 exhibits had gone missing from the Historical Museum in Bishkek. Of these, 29 were made of precious metals. Exhibits were also lost in the Frunze House Museum — more than 100 items.
According to the Security Council, the Ministry of Culture did not report the missing exhibits.
For the sake of fairness, it should be noted that the exhibits were lost over different years, starting from the 1970s and ending in the 2000s. In fact, a criminal case was initiated in 2012 regarding the shortage of exhibits. However, the fact that the disappearance was made public during this period further exacerbated the situation and attracted more criticism towards the ministry and Kazakov personally.
A major scandal related to the Ministry of Culture also unfolded around the burial of the mummy from the Historical Museum.
On October 20, it was reported that archaeologist scientists of the republic demanded the return of the mummy to the historical museum, which had previously been removed from the exhibition and buried. The archaeologists regarded the actions of the agency as an act of vandalism and sent a letter to the president of the country.
The mummy from the historical museum was buried in the Batken region on October 14 at the initiative of the Minister of Culture.
Kazakov also added that the scandal surrounding the mummy was "artificially inflated" to remove him from office. "I'll let you in on a secret: they have long wanted the Minister of Culture to resign. This poor mummy has not been needed by anyone for over 60 years. It just stood there as an exhibit," he stated.
The minister said that a piece of skin and hair from the mummy was left in the museum — according to him, this is enough for research. Kazakov added that there are neither funds nor specialists for the maintenance of the mummy in the museum.
"If I am removed from office today, the issue will be resolved. Let them shoot me, but one cannot mock the dead," Kazakov stated. Additionally, Kazakov cited ethical reasons. "We are Muslims, and according to our Sharia, a deceased person should not be kept for long; the mummy must be buried," he noted.
The head of the archaeology department at the Institute of History and Cultural Heritage of the Academy of Sciences of the republic, Kadicha Tashbaeva, then stated that the decision to bury the mummy was made under pressure from religious leaders.
The mummy of an unknown woman was found by Leningrad archaeologists in 1956 in the Batken region of the Kyrgyz SSR, and it was dated to the 1st-5th centuries AD. The find was transferred to the historical museum in Bishkek.