UNESCO pursues complaint that Mungo reburials violate World Heritage rules

UNESCO wants ‘detailed information’ from Australia about a controversial program to return ancient Indigenous remains to the ground in a World Heritage-listed reach of the outback.

The Mungo National Park in outback NSW. Picture: Tourism NSW

You can now listen to The Australian's articles. Give us your feedback.

You can now listen to The Australian's articles.

A UN agency will investigate whether the status of one of the nation’s oldest World Heritage reserves has been undermined by the reburial of ancient Mungo ­remains in outback NSW.

UNESCO said it had “shared its concerns” with the Australian government about the return to the ground of thousands of fossilised human bones, dating back tens of thousands of years.

In a statement to The Australian, UNESCO said it has asked that the “state party” responsible for the protection and management of the Willandra Lakes World Heritage Area hand over “detailed information” on the controversial reburials.

This could trigger action by the World Heritage Committee, keeper of the register of the planet’s top natural and man-made ­attractions.

“The information received will be passed on to the experts of the UNESCO’s (World Heritage) convention for their review, in particular potential impacts of the reburial on the outstanding universal value of the World Heritage site – the elements of the site that justified its inscription,” the agency said.

“As part of this process, the concerns of the experts could be brought to the attention of the World Heritage Committee, the governing body of the convention composed of 21 member states.

“Each time projects with a possible negative impact on the outstanding universal value of a site are brought to the attention of UNESCO, appropriate measures are taken in co-operation with national authorities, including conducting a technical review and … recommendations.”

Scientists working on the excavation of Mungo Man in 1974. Picture: Jim Bowler

The Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment and Water confirmed on Friday that it had given UNESCO’s World Heritage Centre in Paris “assurances” about the standing of the Willandra Lakes reserve. Reburial of the ancestral remains has now been completed in secret locations in the parched scrubland and sand dune country of NSW’s far southwest corner.

Ranging from fingernail-sized fragments to entire skulls, the bones have been tentatively identified as belonging to 106 individuals who lived alongside the oldest known Australian, Mungo Man, during an ice age more than 40,000 years ago.

The unearthing of the near-intact fossilised skeleton of Mungo Man in 1974 and the prior discovery of the cremated remains of an adult woman, Mungo Lady, excited global interest, confirming that Aboriginal people had created one of the earliest societies of so-called modern humans.

Glimpses of prehistoric life emerged from the subsequent excavations. Among the finds were hundreds of vividly preserved, 20,000-year-old footprints, including those of children traversing the then frozen landscape. The exertions of a one-legged man were suspended in time.

Archaeologist Michael Westaway with an Indigenous rainforest sword recovered from an archaeological dig in far western Queensland. Picture: Lyndon Mechielsen

Archaeologist Michael Westaway, who worked on the Mungo finds, advised UNESCO in writing this month that the “destruction” of the remains could compromise the conservation values that underpinned the listing in 1981, one of the first World Heritage declarations made over an Australian site.

Welcoming the UN body’s intervention on Friday, the University of Queensland researcher said: “This is a really important development because the state-run process by NSW has excluded any voice about why the ancestral remains are so important, not just to Indigenous people and this country, but to the people of the world.

“That’s what UNESCO means when it talks about a World Heritage site’s outstanding universal value and it’s why Willandra was listed in the first place.”

A spokesperson for the NSW Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment and Water said the state government had not been contacted by UNESCO. “This is a matter for the Australian government, as the state party to the World Heritage Convention,” they said.

Mutthi Mutthi traditional owner Jason Kelly is concerned by the reburial of the ancient Mungo remains in the Willandra World Heritage Area. Picture: Darren Seiler

Traditional land owner Jason Kelly, a member of Victoria’s First Peoples’ Assembly who is seeking a court order to compel federal Environment Minister Tanya Plibersek to exercise her heritage-protection powers, conceded it was too late to recover the fossils reinterred over the past three weeks. “Those bones are gone,” the Wamba Wamba-Mutthi Mutthi man told this masthead. “They’re not going to be dug up.”

But he said additional remains were constantly emerging from the shifting terrain, exposed by wind or movement in the dunes. They should go to a “keeping place” accessible to both scientists and the descendants of the old people, he added.

“Not only is Mungo an eroding site, but the governments, particularly the NSW government, have ensured that the rights of the Aboriginal descendants have been constantly eroded by their practices,” Mr Kelly said.

NSW has said that a condition of the approval for the reburials was that the sites were not made public.