Bush culture chief quits over Iraq looting

CRAWFORD, Texas, April 17 (UPI) -- The White House on Thursday said the United States worked hard to protect valuable resources in Iraq as the head of the president's cultural advisory committee quit in protest over accusations that the U.S. military had failed to protect the Arab nation's museum treasures.

"As we have said, the United States, in liberating Iraq, worked very hard to protect the infrastructure of Iraq and to preserve it and the valuable resources of Iraq for the people of Iraq. It is unfortunate that there was looting and damage done to the museum," said White House spokeswoman Claire Buchan.

Martin Sullivan, head of the president's Advisory Committee on Cultural Property, resigned reportedly over the United States' failure to protect the Iraqi National Museum.

No comments came from President George W. Bush this week, who is on his ranch in Crawford, Texas, for the Easter holiday.

The White House did not respond directly to questions about Sullivan's departure, saying only that "at the time that this occurred, there were military operations that were continuing to be under way. And the military did work very hard to preserve the infrastructure for the people."

The administration has offered rewards to the Iraqi people to return the items that were stolen.

The Iraqi National Museum was one of hundreds of sites looted last week as the U.S. military moved into Baghdad and the regime of Saddam Hussein fell. Missing from the museum were antiquities, some of which were thousands of years old.

The museum had re-opened in 2000 nearly a decade after being closed to avoid damage during the 1991 Gulf War. It housed one of the world's most important archaeological collections from ancient Mesopotamian civilizations.

Museum officials had said they were given assurances that military forces would protect the site from looters. The Federal Bureau of Investigation is sending a team to Iraq to try to locate the treasures.

(Reported by UPI White House Reporter Kathy Gambrell in Washington.)