Curbing the US Trade in Smuggled Artefacts from Bulgaria and China

This week saw the adoption of a bilateral agreement with Bulgaria and the renewal of an agreement with China under the CPIA. Rick St Hilaire reminds us what this is about ('Bilateral Agreements Adopted Covering Bulgarian and Chinese Heritage in Jeopardy' 16 Jan 2014):

"[P]romoting U.S. leadership in achieving greater international cooperation towards preserving cultural treasures that not only are of importance to the nations whence they originate, but also to a greater international understanding of our common heritage."

That is the focus of the Convention on Cultural Property Implementation Act (CPIA) according to the 1982 U.S. Senate Report describing the implementation of the 1970 UNESCO Convention on the Means of Prohibiting and Preventing the Illicit Import, Export, and Transfer of Ownership of Cultural Property.

His text contains a summary of the MOUs and also specifically mentions the casus of coins and those who'd exempt them from any kind of legal protection at the US end against smuggling.