One day the pro-collecting advocacy movement will finally have its day in court, and the true story of what has taken place behind the scenes at Cultural Heritage Center will be made public. In my opinion, the public and our legislators will be shocked by what will be disclosed.Not half as much as I think they would be learning about what actually happens in the dugup antiquity trade. Dealer Dave reckons:
Freedom of information is essential to the preservation of our liberties and our democratic society. Every US citizen should understand that obsessive secrecy and refusal to make mandated freedom of information disclosures may indicate that something which cannot stand the light of day is being concealed.One might say exactly the same about the dugup antiquity trade- including that which US dealers continue with Bulgarian dugup antiquities. Who are the middlemen in this trade?
Getty's Tim Potts says the way to deal with antiquity smuggling is to "educate" the Ignorant Darkies of the Source Countries to stop them "allowing" this to happen. He should tell that to the farmers of Siwa Oasis in Egypt. There smuggling has reportedly been going on under the noses of the authorities, who seemed unconcerned unless it involved drugs or weapons. Yesterday the locals ("parents and religious leaders") were planing to organize a protest meeting outside the police checkpoint. At three in the afternoon about 50 people had gathered and stood there waiting for the rest of the residents and the elders of the oasis to arrive. The meeting never took place, the assembly learnt of the outbreak of a small fire in the fields. The wind helped it to spread aggressively, and the farmers were busy fighting the resulting conflagration into the middle of the night. Many hectares of arable land with standing crops were ruined, farms were burnt. It seemed the smugglers wanted to send the villagers a message concerning what would happen if they tried to stop them.
Smugglers are criminals. Very often the organized criminal groups behind this trade act in various ways - including the ruthless use of violence - to ensure that the officials who should be vigilant at the borders 'look the other way' and nobody interferes. People who buy smuggled goods of any kind, antiquities included, are dealing with criminals. Dealers who sell artefacts which were smuggled out of source countries may mislead their clients into thinking the artefacts are "rescued" from the Oriental "ignorance" and "corruption" of the "Natives". They are instead selling the proceeds of a criminal activity, often knowingly - for how can it be otherwise?
SAFE now has a petition on the aptly-named "Change.org" website which people can use to show their support for measures to prevent antiquities smuggling from Bulgaria. So far it has about a third as many signatories as the supporters of buying smuggled artefacts have comments on the Regulations.gov website, which is odd. The petition allows comments, I wrote this: The US is a state party of the 1970 UNESCO Convention and as should do its part to prevent the illicit trade in antiquities from other states parties (irrespective of article 9). What is happening now under everyone's noses on the US antiquities market (in which artefacts removed from archaeological sites in Bulgaria have figured prominently) fills me with disgust. It is well past time for the US to step in and do something about this.And it is. It is telling that it needs Bulgaria to actually ask and SAFE start a petition before anyone over there will lift a finger to do anything about this totally open trade in looted archaeological artefacts.
The US based voluntary heritage organization SAFE (Saving Antiquities for Everyone) urges: Say YES to Bulgaria. The government of the Republic of Bulgaria has requested a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the United States of America to restrict imports of illicit archaeological and ethnological materials from Bulgaria. This request is a substantial step toward enabling the US government to help stop the looting of archaeological sites and cultural monuments in Bulgaria and the smuggling of the products to the international market.Somebody at SAFE has been very busy and produced a very clear 'advocacy' page which I'd like sympathetic readers to make as well known as possible before the 2nd November. It sets out very clearly the major issues in relation to the "section 303(a)1" issues on which the public are invited to comment. In terms of making informed comments, that puts the White Hat Guys at an advantage over coineys and the suchlike who have only been fed inflammatory lies and misleading misdirection by the dealer's paid stooges.
The SAFE page has four main sections which make it easy to understand the whole issue and why we should be concerned about it:
This text includes a bibliography of just a few of the news items that have been coming out of the country in recent years about the successes of the Bulgarian authorities in apprehending smugglers and looters, and the sort of items that have been involved.Bulgaria's cultural heritage endangered
The devastating effects of illegal excavations
why not give your readers a LINK to where on my blog I say this "misleading" thing? Or are you afraid that they will read what I actually say and check it out? http://paul-barford.blogspot.com/2011/10/accg-international-affairs-chair-on.html There are some questions to you there now, too, just what kind of section 2606 "MOU" does what Nevine El-Aref who you cite here as an authority says?
Paul, This is in my view mere propaganda as presently written, and I won't accept anything in that vein for appearance in my blog. If you rewrite it to focus on specific issues, such as I believe you have with what Nevine El-Aref said in her article, I will reconsider this decision.Well, it is not "propaganda" at all to suggest when talking about my blog, he gives a link to it so people can see what was actually written. Note that when somebody refers to the El-Aref article as "proof" that I am wrong about the nature of the announced document, but then finding himself unable to answer the question about whether what El-Aref says can be squared in any way with what he claims, he refuses to post the comment. What a surprise. Typical coiney intellectual shallowness.
it's not often that we're ALL given the opportunity to lend our voices to the creation of these laws. Please, take some time to write a little something something to help save the world's history from disappearing completely.It is nice to see that somebody spent a few hours actually reading up on the issues before deciding what to write - unlike the first hundred people that have sent some fuddled ill-thought-out kneejerk nonsense in support of keeping smuggled artefacts in circulation on the US market.
I have added a link in the sidebar over to the left to the webpage Cultural Property Advisory Committee Meeting - Bulgaria Docket ID: DOS-2011-0115 Agency: DOS where the coineys will be exhibiting the fruits of their deepest reflections on portable antiquity collecting issues for the benefit of the CPAC and the international community. At the time of writing, none of them has dared become the first philistine to complain his collectors' rights to buy illegally exported coins are being violated by do-gooders.
A recent anti-antiquities smuggling operation by the Athens security police's antiquities smuggling division together with culture ministry official in the city of Thessaloniki led to the arrest on Thursday of two men and the recovery of what Greek police say are "more than 70 items of great archaeological importance”. They apparently date from the 6th century B.C. to the 5th century BC and included: gold masks, four helmets, a glass perfume bottle, small clay statues and part of a gold diadem and parts of an iron sword decorated with gold leaf.The items were taken to the National Archaeological Museum in Athens (where it seems they were viewed by Prime Minister George Papandreou, Citizens’ Protection Minister Christos Papoutsis and Culture Minister Pavlos Geroulanos).
Citizens’ Protection Ministry officials told Kathimerini that given the items’ Macedonian heritage, it was imperative that they not to leave the country and run the risk of being “rediscovered” during an “official” excavation in a neighboring country.Sources: Associated Press: Greek authorities seize smuggled antiquities MSNBC News 10/6/2011
Over a hundred stolen ancient Egyptian Greek and Roman artefacts have been returned to Egypt after a whirlwind few months of travel. They were seized in Melbourne at an (unnamed) auction house in November 2010 and it was determined that they had been smuggled from Egypt to Australia. They were discovered because the seller had put them on sale through the internet and the Egyptian embassy presented an official request to retrieve them. They have been presented by Australian authorities to the Egyptian ambassador in Australia, Omar Metwali. This is apparently the third repatriation from Australia in such circumstances in recent years. Why don't you take your campaign against imports of unprovenanced artifacts to your home in Poland if this is so important to you?One reason is that I simply do not see the scale of looting of archaeological sites here in Poland that we see in other countries. I have had good contacts with the metal detectorists here for coming up to two decades and in my view, the hobby here is quite a different one from that in the UK. Most people with metal detectors in this country are searching sites of the Second World War. That's what turns them on, any metal detecting magazine here (we have three main ones) will show this. Some of my colleagues write very alarmist articles about Polish metal detecting, but - frankly - "they ain't seen nothing yet". They have no idea (because they get most of their information from reading the mollifying pap put out by the PAS) just how what the "black sheep" are doing here to archaeological sites compares with what thousands of run-of-the-mill irresponsible detectorists get up to in the UK.
Without going into detail, suffice to say that there are interesting similarities and differences between this and those of "the west". Tompa obviously thinks I should spend my time campaigning against it and leave the Americans and British collectors alone. So, is the Polish antiquities market as serious a problem as those two?
I was curious to know why the tarantula smuggler article here was so popular, every week, several people from the most widely-scattered parts of the world look at it. I assumed a popular arachnophile forum might have a link to it. I was curious where it might be and began to look through these forums and in the process had a peek at what people who keep these animals write about. I found that there is a name for the sending of invertebrates through the post without fulfilling the legal export and import formalities. They call it brown boxing - the sending of declarable items in anonymous unmarked (or misleadingly marked) packages so as not to attract attention. I found this on Todd Gearheart's "Tarantulaspiders.com, "The Cutting Edge of Arachnoculture" website, in the "Legal - news, laws and regulations you need to know about section:This is an illegal activity when a U.S. buyer purchases from a foreign seller wildlife and has the shipment received in the postal mail without declaring the contents to U.S. customs and U.S. Fish & Wildlife. People do this to get around not having to pay expensive, but legally required import costs,and/or to acquire illegal species and/or to gain an advantage in the commercial market by not having import cost overhead.A telling difference between the invertebrate buying and antiquity buying milieus is the last sentence:
It hurts our hobby and trade. Do NOT buy from people that do this.
•*A seller posts an ad on for a rare species that has sold for a high price by a majority of other sellers a price with a price 50% less or more than their competitors. A "too good to be true" price.
• Seller does not have an import permit (or technically did not have a permit until recently
• Seller does not buy from other known suppliers with import permits
•*Seller's price list consistently undercuts their competition and sells stock so low, you have to question how did they get the stock and put up such a low price.
•*Seller's customers tend to be "newbies", very young, who go for price first purchases and never think about these red flags.
Now, anybody in the know, do some research and triangulate and figure in a process of elimination and you know who these brown-boxing sellers are, don't you? Brown-boxing hurts the hobby - period. Don't buy from sellers engaged in this practice. It hurts breeders, investors, legal importers and brings gov. attention to our hobby. Regulate ourselves. Don't buy from brown-boxing sellers.
The collection of objects, including at least 18,000 coins from the Roman Empire and other ancient civilizations, was described as spanning "more than 2,600 years" of the history of the Balkan nation. The objects encompass aspects of Greek, Roman, Macedonian, Byzantine, Bulgarian and Ottoman cultural heritage, officials said.Two and a half thousand years of history stolen by the no-questions-asked antiquities trade. The objects seized were diverse, from bronze eagles, rings and belt buckles to spearheads and bone sewing needles — but none of them apparently accompanied by any kind of documentation concerning where they had been dug up how and with what. Dealers and collectors are not interested in context of deposition, such information has no commercial value in today's market. In fact, it's considered better not to ask, bad form to enquire too closely.
Believed to have been excavated illegally and shipped to Canada as part of an international smuggling operation, some of the artifacts were intercepted by customs officials with the Canada Border Services Agency in 2007. A subsequent police investigation led to the search of a home in Quebec and the recovery of many more historical objects, according to RCMP Asst. Commissioner Mike Cabana. But he told Postmedia News that police also learned during their probe that other ancient artifacts illegally imported from Bulgaria had already been sold in Canada. And while a Quebec court ruled earlier this year that the 21,000 seized objects should be returned to Bulgaria, a "person of interest" initially arrested in Quebec in connection with the illegal shipment was eventually released without charges.Randy Boswell, 'Cultural artifacts seized in Canada returned to grateful owners', Montreal Gazette June 10th 2011.
This Friday evening at a ceremony at the Canadian Museum of Civilization the Ministry of Canadian Heritage and Official Languages returned the largest ever Canadian seizure of stolen cultural property to the Republic of Bulgaria. Going back were 21,000 coins, pieces of jewellery, and other objects that were illegally exported to Canada and seized by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. Vezhdi Rashidov, Minister of Culture of the Republic of Bulgaria, was present to accept the artefacts from the Government of Canada. Madame Irina Bokova, Director General of UNESCO, came over for the event. The usual speeches were made.In 2007, Canada Border Services Agency officials detained two imports of cultural property sent by mail from Bulgaria. These imports were referred to Canadian Heritage for further assessment, and the RCMP was asked to investigate. As a result of its investigation, the RCMP seized about 21,000 ancient coins, pieces of jewellery, and other objects in November 2008. In January 2011, the importer formally abandoned the cultural property, clearing the way for the Court ofQuebec to rule under the Criminal Code for the return of the seized antiquities to the Republic of Bulgaria. These objects, many of which were illegally excavated, cover more than 2600 years of the history of Bulgaria. This collection includes more than 18,000 coins, as well as a number of artifacts including bronze eagles, rings, pendants, belt buckles, arrows and spearheads, and bone sewing needles. They represent a mix of Hellenistic, Roman, Macedonian, Byzantine, Bulgarian, and Ottoman cultural heritage.The "importer" involved in this attempted smuggling was not named. But there are not too many coin dealers selling this kind of stuff in that part of Canada, are there?
Canada and Bulgaria are signatories to the 1970 UNESCO Convention on the Means of Prohibiting and Preventing the Illicit Import, Export and Transfer of Cultural Property, under which participating states agree to assist each other in the recovery of illegally exported and stolen cultural property. In Canada, the Convention is implemented through the Cultural Property Export and Import Act [1985], administered by the Department of Canadian Heritage. The Department works closely with the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and the Canada Border Services Agency to enforce and administer the Act and combat the illicit traffic of cultural property.Huge numbers of such artefacts flow through the US market annually. In fact a substantial portion of the market seems to have been initiated by the flow of masses of cheap dugup coins precisely from Bulgaria. The USA and Bulgaria are signatories to the 1970 UNESCO Convention on the Means of Prohibiting and Preventing the Illicit Import, Export and Transfer of Cultural Property, under which participating states agree to assist each other in the recovery of illegally exported and stolen cultural property. In the United States, the Convention is implemented through the Convention on Cultural Property Implementation Act 1983, administered by the Department of State (unlike countries like Canada, the USA has no Ministry of American Heritage). Despite this, very few shipments of looted coins and artefacts stripped from archaeological sites by gangs of criminals have ever been stopped at the US border, or investigated, located and retrieved by US law enforcement agencies (DHS, FBI etc).
news agency reported on June 8 2011 that about 21 000 smuggled archaeological objects and ancient coins will be returned to Bulgaria by the Canadian department for cultural heritage. A delegation headed by Bulgarian Culture Minister Vezhdi Rashidov will receive the items at a special ceremony on June 10 at the Museum of Civilization in Otawa. Following a decision of the Canadian court, the archaeological items, proven to be of Bulgarian origin, will be given back to Bulgaria.That'd probably be something like 30kg of 'partifacts' and coins then. This is probably the same haul as this one reported from 2010:
In August, customs officers in the Canadian city of Montreal seized 21 000 antique objects with Bulgarian origins, in a smuggling attempt. The antiques consist of coins, jewels, metal and glass objects from the Bulgarian, Greek, Roman, Byzantine and Ottoman heritage.I discussed this on this blog at the time. It is interesting to note that we are nowhere nearer to learning the answer to any of the questions I raised here last year when discussing this, who sent these coins from where, and to where? 'Repatriation' of the artefacts involved alone will do nothing to stop the smuggling and looting. Remaining silent about the source and destination of the illicit artefacts does nothing to help citizens learn about the mechanism of the trade in illicit objects and therefore how they can avoid becoming a participant.
David Gill ('Publishing recently surfaced Mayan pots') draws attention to a recent article in the Smithsonian Magazine (Chip Brown, "El Mirador, the Lost City of the Maya", May 2011) which is illustrated by photos of what seem to be looted ceramic vessels[A]s a subscriber, I'm happy Smithsonian does not limit its illustrations only to artifacts from documented archaeological excavations.That follows. If those complete pots had been looted from native American graves on US soil, would the subscriber be equally "happy"? Is looting OK for these people when it happens in somebody else's country?
my point was, and is, that NO journal should tart up articles with looted artifact. This is an appalling lapse of intelligence and ethics. These pieces are looted. Hence they were acquired by illegal actions. To publish such pieces is to tacitly acquiesce to looting, smuggling, and the vending of stolen goods. That Smithsonian should do it, and offer such puerile excuses, is not defensible.But Peter Tompa - retained by international numismatic trade associations - openly states that he is "happy" that an institution like the Smithsonian ignores such notions and has lower expectations of his local museum.
As we have seen, the artefact collector and antiquity dealer are all to frequently keen to play the victim. Another such victim seems to be the case of Utah tour guide John Lund, reportedly accused in Israel of selling artefacts without the required permits, and attempting to remove them from the country without an export permit (apparently on Monday May 16th, but he says 14th) . He signed some papers ("in Hebrew") admitting this, but upon his arrival in the States, he began protesting his innocence. See Sarah Dallof, 'Utah historian accused of smuggling antiquities out of Israel', May 19th, 2011. There's a video from KSL Broadcasting Salt Lake City (can't seem to embed it) in which he makes light of the charges, comparing himself to Goody Two Shoes encountering a "dragon". See also Matthew Kalman, 'Retired U.S. Academic Is Arrested in Israel on Suspicion of Antiquities Trafficking', The Chronicle of Higher Education May 18, 2011.the retired lecturer from Murray, Utah, said he was never informed of any wrongdoing in more than 30 years of guiding thousands of people to visit holy sites in the Middle East and bringing antiquities with him to tell biblical stories."They're saying I was trying to sneak these items out of Israel, and it's just a gross misrepresentation of the facts," the 70-year-old Lund said. His latest trip began earlier this month when he led a group of 96 tourists to Israel. Like his previous outings, Lund brought along antiquities such as oil lamps and coins to help illustrate the history and tell stories about the region. They were antiquities he said he had purchased on previous trips around the Mediterranean region. Lund said he was questioned at customs about the items when he entered Israel and allowed to pass without any problems.So he's done this before? The logic of a tour guide "bringing antiquities with him to tell biblical stories" as he takes tourists around the sites and museums of the Holy Land beats me. Are there not enough objects in the museums to tell those stories? ("Helped tell biblical stories as part of the trip designed to highlight sites important to Christians", "He incorporates the artifacts into the tours by explaining the travelers the parables of Jesus" - so how many lamps and Roman glass vessels do you need to do that then? ). The photos show he had quite a few duplicates of each object type. Would not a powerpoint presentation on his laptop be enough for evening cultural talks? Why then do the Israeli Antiquity Authorities say they saw him selling these items? Are they not telling the truth? What would be the connection, if any, between the alleged sale watched by IAA staff and the reported seizure of artefacts from tourists, allegedly from the same group, at the Israeli border? If I understand what he is saying, Lund asserts that these artefacts were purchased from legitimate Israeli dealers - so why could those carrying them not show documentation of that fact? Why are these people not now coming forward to claim their property?
had run out of cash for souvenirs. He had them write him personal checks in $200 amounts in exchange for extra cash Lund had brought in case such a situation occurred. He also arranged group purchases of Bethlehem baby blankets and Bethlehem alabaster jars with spikenard inside and said he did not make money on the transaction.Lund does however add that he
also facilitated the $2,000 purchase of a silver Tyre shekel, also known as a Judas coin, for one of the tour participants."We were buying antiques as souvenirs from legitimate dealers just like what normal tourists would do and no one ever told us we needed a special visa (sic)", of course if tourists buy antiquities from registered dealers, they get the export licence with the object. What did Lund do, throw them away? I also wonder about the bloke who claims to be writing a book on "Biblical coins of interest to Christians" and who is himself the owner of at least one "binder" of them, who would not tell a tour party member to save his money because he can buy a decent example of that shekel back in the states for about a quarter of the price.
Lund said he's currently gathering affidavits to build a defense case. He's in touch with the U.S. Embassy in Israel, and is seeking legal counsel. Despite the hiccup, Lund said he loves Israel, and now that he understands the laws, he'll try to make it right. "You wont' find a greater advocate for Israel then me and for sustaining the laws of the land," he said. Lund said he's concerned for American tourists in Israel who are in the dark like he was. "Innocently, all over the place, people are buying items, hauling them out of the country and not even aware that they're technically smugglers," he said. "I think Israel has an obligation to let us know that."Umm, I think they do. How can anyone ignoring cultural property laws, Americans or not, claim to be doing it "innocently"? Ignorance of the law is no excuse. Surely it is also the responsibility of travel companies to employ as guides people who are knowledgeable about local laws that may affect their clients? Dr Lund has at best showed himself woefully ill-informed in this regard.
Peru has a 1997 cultural property MOU with the US referring to pre-Columbian archaeological artifacts and colonial ethnological materials from all areas of Peru. On that basis it got back from the US a mixed load of seized cultural goodies on May 12th. The artefacts were discovered as part of three separate investigations by ICE's Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) in New York and Denver. There was a book found in the bagage of a passenger to Houston who was on an ICE stop-list, but also some archaeological material from other seizures, including a pot with a feline on one side and standing feline, A.D. 300-360, handmade textile and two headbands all of cotton, most likely excavated from graves along the Pacific coast of Peru, and a stone jaguar-human sculpture, 1200-1500 years old, likely Chavín or Moche in origin. The artefacts repatriated are valued at more than $43,000. Not bad for a group of old pots and rags, which shows clearly how the value placed on them by collectors is the motor for digging them up and smuggling them out of the country.These hundreds of laws include the ones the ACCG, PNG and IAPN are trying to have overturned to allow the free importation into the United States of illegally exported items from countries with cultural property MOUs with the US.ICE HSI plays a leading role in investigating crimes involving the illicit importation and distribution of cultural property. ICE HSI uses its investigative authority to seize cultural property items if they were illegally imported into the United States. It also investigates the illegal trafficking of artwork, especially works that have been reported lost or stolen. ICE's Office of International Affairs, through its 69 attaché offices in 47 countries, works closely with foreign governments to conduct joint investigations, when possible.
ICE's specially trained investigators and foreign attachés partner with governments, agencies and experts to protect cultural antiquities as well as train investigators from other nations and agencies on how to find and authenticate cultural property, and how to best enforce the law to recover these items when they emerge in the marketplace.
More than 2,400 artifacts have been returned to 19 countries since 2007 including paintings from France, Germany and Austria; an 18th century manuscript from Italy; and a bookmark belonging to Hitler as well as cultural artifacts from Iraq including Babylonian, Sumerian and neo-Assyrian items.[...]
CBP is the nation's lead border security agency and is charged with enforcing hundreds of laws at and between our nation's 327 international ports of entry. As part of that mission, CBP enforces bi-lateral agreements and import restrictions on certain foreign cultural property and archaeological materials. CBP works closely with ICE and other federal, state and local law enforcement agencies to prevent the illegal trade and trafficking of cultural antiquities. CBP partners with ICE to ensure that illegally traded and trafficked antiquities are returned to their rightful owners.
Rather embarrassing, but I am sure it was dealt with consummate diplomatic delcacy by the recipients of a rather special gift. A delegation from the Gaza strip led by former Palestinian minister of foreign affairs Mahmoud El-Zahar delivered some objects they believed had been looted from Egypt to Egypt’s Minister of State for Antiquities on Thursday. The pieces were found in the Gaza strip "with Palestinians who were caught red-handed and accused of smuggling antiquities". The pieces concerned are black "granite " (sic) statues apparently "depicting an ancient Egyptian god" and "an ushabti figurine". But this is apparently what they look like:
The man was indicted in 2003 in Oregon for smuggling and conspiracy to transport, receive, possess, conceal and store stolen property. The individual pleaded guilty to smuggling and was sentenced to probation. Two other individuals were also identified as part of the employee’s conspiracy. ICE HSI agents intercepted shipments of pre-Columbian artifacts destined for the United States addressed to one of those individuals, a professor at a U.S. university. Both individuals were indicted for conspiracy to transport, receive, possess, conceal and store stolen property though the charges were ultimately dismissed. The professor agreed to turn over 99 Panamanian pre-Columbian artifacts that he illegally imported into the United States from Panama as part of the plea agreement. In 2005, ICE HSI agents in Los Angeles and Portland supervised the authentication, inventory and seizure of the 99 artifacts.
The artefacts were mostly pottery vessels (which "represent a very complete sample of most of the pottery styles in pre-Columbian Panama from the period A.D. 1 through 1500") pedestal plates, metates and figurines, valued at approximately $100,000. They were probably looted from graves in south-western Veraguas around the shores of the Gulf of Montijo. The items were handed back to Panamanian President Ricardo Martinelli at ICE headquarters.
The usual speeches were made.
Is this story related to this?
