Brussels, 11/04/2014 (Agence Europe) - An informal EP-Council of Ministers' deal to update rules to help member states recover cultural objects unlawfully removed from their country was endorsed on Thursday 10 April by the European Parliament's culture and education committee (see EUROPE 11028).
Several EU member states, such as Italy, Poland, France, 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 six months (rather than the current two) to decide whether an object found in another member state is a national treasure that was illegally exported from the country and they will have three years (compared with the current twelve months) in which to request its return.
Any 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 will 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.
The European Commission estimates that some 8,000 crimes against national heritage are committed, and about 40,000 cultural objects illegally removed, every year. The EP plenary will vote on the final report on Wednesday 16 April and the new rules require the formal approval of the Council in order to come into force. (LC)