One example of international cooperation in the protection of cultural assets was the temporary storage of art treasures from the National Museum in Kabul, Afghanistan, in Switzerland. The art objects, which were severely threatened in the National Museum both by the Afghan Civil War (1996–2001) that lasted until 1995 and by the subsequent rule of the Taliban regime, were moved to a so-called "Afghanistan Museum in Exile" in the Swiss town of Bubendorf in 1999 with the consent of all parties to the conflict. The exhibition, which was supported primarily by the voluntary work of Swiss citizens and exiled Afghans, as well as by donations of around 1.5 million Swiss francs and supervised by the Swiss Afghanistan Institute based in Bubendorf, was open to the public from October 2000 to October 2006 and was visited by around 50,000 people during this time. In March 2007, the objects were returned to Kabul under the direction of UNESCO and with the support of the German Air Force. According to the spokesman of the Bubendorf Museum, this was the largest return of art objects since the end of the Second World War.