Iran Press/Iran News: "The problems Iraq has been going through are impeding the protection of artifacts and historical monuments," Ali Asghar Mounesan said on Tuesday.
"We are looking forward to paving the way for Iran to help restore Taq Kasra and save this historic building from collapse," Mounesan added.
The famed Taq Kasra arch, also known as the Arch of Ctesiphon after the ancient city of Ctesiphon, located in today's Al-Madain approximately 25 miles south of Baghdad, was built in 550CE during the reign of the Sasanian King Khosrow I. Ctesiphon originally served as the winter capital of the Parthian and the later Sasanian empires.
The pre-Islamic structure was part of a larger Sasanian-era palace and is considered to be the largest single-span, unreinforced brick vault arch in the world.
According to UNESCO, the four meters of the arched roof collapsed due to heavy rains. The Director-General of the Iraqi State Board of Antiquities and Heritage, Ayad Hamza, described the site as being in "dangerous and critical" condition requiring immediate maintenance and repairs to prevent further collapse.
Iran's Mehr news agency reported: "Social media activists and cultural heritage lovers have also criticized the Iraqi government's neglect of the monument, disapproving the poor governmental performance in maintaining it."
Despite years of talks between Iranian and Iraqi officials to jointly restore the structure, no such concerted effort has been realized. Both countries have also recently sought to have the Taq Kasra listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
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