Return of illegally exported cultural objects
11 Apr 2014 11:50 AM
An informal deal with Council on revised rules
to help member states recover cultural objects unlawfully removed from their
territory was endorsed by the Culture and Education Committee on Thursday by 14
votes to one.
Several EU countries, such as Italy, Poland, France, and
Germany and Romania, have suffered serious thefts and illegal exports of
cultural heritage goods since the single market was created.
Any
object which is classified by a member state’s national law as a
"national treasure", and which was unlawfully removed from its
territory after 1993, could henceforth be recovered by means of a more flexible
return procedure. To enable repatriation of the largest possible number of
objects, all age and financial value limits have been deleted from the new
text.
National authorities will have 6 months (previously 2
months) to establish whether an object found in another member state
constitutes a classified cultural object, illegally removed from its territory,
and may file their claim for restitution within 3 years (previously one
year).
Compensation is due only if the goods were acquired with
"due diligence".
A person who possesses a cultural
object claimed by a member state would have to prove that when acquiring the
object, he or she took all necessary steps to ascertain that it came from a
legal source: the circumstances of the acquisition, the exit permits required
and consultation of stolen cultural object registers would be taken into
account.
If
the possessor cannot provide such evidence, the claimant state would no longer
be required to pay him or her compensation.
Statistics on crimes against national
heritage
The
European Commission estimates that about 8,000 crimes against national heritage
are committed, and about 40,000 cultural objects illegally removed, every year.
Internationally, cultural objects are the third most smuggled item, after drugs
and arms, according to UNESCO and UN statistics.
Next steps
Plenary will vote on the final report on Wednesday, 16
April at noon after Tuesday evening's debate. The recast than needs formal
approval by Council to enter into force.