OUT of public view, in its back rooms and vaults, the Natural History Museum in London is home to some 20,000 items of human remains. Gathered from around the world, some are whole skeletons, others consist of locks of hair or single teeth. Most were stolen from graves and traditional burial sites during the days of empire. Yet repatriation has never been an option for these or any of the other 60,000 items of human remains held in museums in the UK, because British law forbids it.
While the US, Australia and more recently Sweden have taken steps to return remains, the UK has yet to budge. You and your ministerial colleagues are now reviewing the situation. It is high time for a change.
In November, a report from your own advisers – led by Norman Palmer, an expert on cultural property law at University College London – broadly backed the claims of indigenous peoples (91av, 15 November 2003, p 9). We welcome its proposal to remove the present legal barriers to repatriation and introduce a code of conduct on how museums and scientists should treat remains. We also support obligations on institutions to survey their collections, identify traditional owners, contact them, and seek their permission to carry out research. But while many scientists condemn the report as going too far, we feel it does not go far enough.
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We are concerned that the UK’s proposed Human Remains Advisory Panel, which is intended to adjudicate in disputes between claimant communities and museums, will not be truly independent and will not include representatives of indigenous peoples. We should not have to battle in complex legal arguments before an overseas tribunal and carry the burden of proof that human remains were taken without consent. Nor should we have to prove a genealogical or cultural connection for our wishes to be taken into account.
The strongest argument put forward for not returning these remains is that important scientific benefits can be derived from studying them. Indigenous people are not backward or anti-science: we are aware of the possible benefits of research. But why should our rights be sacrificed for the alleged benefit of humanity in general when others are not asked to make such a sacrifice? The Human Tissue Bill now making its way through the UK parliament has made it clear that the scientific benefits from tissue and organs taken from deceased patients do not take precedence over the rights of those people and their families.
Many people in the west, especially scientists, seem to fail to grasp just how offensive and damaging the continued retention of these remains is to the physical and spiritual well-being of our communities. Unlike ever-changing white laws, Aboriginal customary law is as old as our culture and it does not change. The remains of our ancestors are a fundamental part of our culture. Unless they are buried on the land to which they belong, their spirits will not rest, and the living will continue to grieve and suffer physical and mental pain. In our law, only descendants of the deceased have the authority to make decisions about the treatment of our ancestors.
This is not to say that research is impossible. We recognise and appreciate the efforts of the many highly ethical scientists and institutions that want to negotiate and facilitate the return of remains. We can and will work with you. We may agree to research particularly if it helps determine the provenance of remains. We have previously agreed to research on a number of occasions.
Indigenous people are willing to negotiate these issues, but ultimately the decision must rest with us. Where research is justified, the expertise to undertake it almost always exists in Australia, so there is no longer any excuse for remains to be held overseas. We believe the continued retention of remains against our wishes is a breach of the terms and spirit of international law and the UN’s International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. Article 1 of this agreement, which the UK has signed, guarantees that all peoples have the right to freely determine their “cultural development”. This is currently denied to us.
Our protest will continue until the necessary reforms are introduced. Don’t be surprised to see protest banners saying “It’s time for you to give back our remains” at the ICC Champions Trophy cricket series in England this September. After 216 years of colonial occupation we are all too well aware that we have to keep fighting to achieve the same rights as everybody else.
As the Palmer report pointed out, the theft of human remains from white communities would lead to criminal punishment and mass outrage. But here we are still pleading for the return of what is morally, spiritually, culturally and legally ours, while the descendants and beneficiaries of thieves and grave robbers still rationalise their crimes and still claim to own what was stolen. My message to you, as you review the UK’s position, is this: anything less than a wholesale change in the law and the attitude of scientists would be a travesty.