Alerte au pillage des royaumes de Saba
Karel Prokop
2006 - 52 min - HD 16/9 - Couleur - France

In northern Yemen is a desert region called Jawf. This supposedly dangerous territory, which is only under the partial control of the central government, is now the scene of the massive plundering of pre-Islamic relics by local tribes with the complicity of international antiquities traffickers.
A Franco-Yemeni archeological mission was to go there in 2006 to excavate a temple dating from 2000 BCE and to draw up a map of the main sites threatened by the plunderers. But the local tribes, aware this could mean the end of their activities, and their only income, opposed the coming of the archeologists despite an order from the Yemeni president. The film crew, which was to accompany the expedition, managed to enter this forbidden zone on its own and bring back footage and accounts of what can be only called a cultural disaster. But several event-filled days later, the discord among the tribes almost degenerated into open warfare. The army decided to recall the film crew from a region where differences are settled with Kalashnikovs.