Restoring relics

A heritage conservationist from the US has been working on a Dunhuang cave for decades, with happy results, Liu Xiangrui reports.

When he first visited the Mogao Grottoes in 1989, Neville Agnew didn't expect the site near Northwest China's Gobi desert to become his regular haunt.

A specialist in the conservation of relics, Agnew has been going to the caves filled with Buddhist statues in Gansu province, as part of a long-term engagement between his US employer and the Dunhuang Academy to work on guarding the UNESCO World Heritage site against decay and human effects.