Update on Looting in Libya

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Readers might recall the London classical archaeologist who was building a database of looted objects describing the notion that there might have been looting going on in Libya during the civil ware there as "silly". Sadly it seems her sunny optimism was misplaced and she has some more stuff to include on her database. While attention was focussed on the spectacular ruins of Leptis Magna (where a CNN article, 'Libyans battle to protect ancient treasures from looting', October 13, 2011, reports some exemplary measures taken to preserve the museum objects and their inventory) it's a different story a day's drive to the east in Benghazi. Apparently the museum there has had

some of its most valuable and historic exhibits stolen, and to make matters worse for tracking them, no photographic documentation has so far come to light. More than 7,000 rare and valuable coins dating back to Alexander the Great comprise 90% of the so-called "Benghazi treasures." The other items in the collection are various artifacts from the same period. All of them are uniquely important and utterly irreplaceable.

UNESCO's senior crisis first responder, lawyer and archaeological expert Louise Haxthausen says UNESCO (you know, the one the US government threatens cutting funding for to prevent the world's nations from taking their OWN democratic decision about Palestine) is playing a lead role in helping the investigation. She says:

"we are working very closely with Interpol on this. Interpol sends out alerts to customs to the police officers with a clear description of that collection and then hopefully they can seize them." But the effort doesn't stop there, she says. Lists of the artifacts are being publicized and she says "we are also in contact with auction houses of course with dealers, with collectors, and we warn them of the situation so that if it comes on market they will know this is the result of illicit trafficking."

Will they? How will the no-questions-asked market react to unprovenanced coins of Alexander the Great with desert patina appearing from nowhere (like 99% of all the rest of the coins of Alexander the Great with desert patina on the market) ? Has the ACCG put out an alert for its members to watch out for coins of Alexander the great appearing on the market with no stated collecting history? Haxthausen worries that once items are taken out of the country getting them back can be nearly impossible.

She cites the wartime theft in 2003 of numerous treasures from the Baghdad museum in Iraq. Most experts, she says, believe the looting was the work of professional, organized international illicit traffickers. "The looting of the Baghdad museum was very heavy and it has been very difficult. Despite mobilizing all actors it has been very difficult to get a big part of the collection back." The biggest problem she says is that without, or with very limited documentation [in the no-questions-asked market - added PMB] it can be hard to prove the items' rightful owners, and if they are out of the country even harder to prove where they came from.

Of course if buyers in the trade actually asked for verifiable documentation of licit provenance, the problem would not exist, items on the market illicitly (because smuggled or stolen) would not be marketable.

Interpol alert on stolen treasures from Libya

UPDATE: More on this by Larry Rothfield from a different slant: 'Libyan Sites get the Once Over'. Please read.