Moscow reacted Wednesday after the Dutch court decision to return to Kiev the rich collection loaned by Crimea to a Museum of Amsterdam less than a month before the annexation of this peninsula by Moscow.
Le Monde with AFP
A long battle lasting for seven years. In the aftermath of the Dutch court decision to give the Ukraine archaeological treasures of Crimea contested between Moscow and Kiev, Russia has announced, Wednesday, October 27, the beginning of an investigation to estimate his prejudice in this file.
The Russian Investigation Committee, in charge of the main criminal cases, indicated in a statement that it will do “an appropriate assessment of the violation of the interests of Russia”. This procedure, which will be under the responsibility of its Crimean antenna, will aim to establish, in collaboration with the Russian diplomacy, the circumstances “of the non-return” of this archaeological treasure.
The Amsterdam Court of Appeal ordered Tuesday the return to Ukraine from a collection of an invaluable value of archaeological objects – retained since the Netherlands – loaned by Crimea to a Museum of Amsterdam for The exhibition “La Crimea. Gold and Secrets of the Black Sea”, before the annexation of this peninsula by Moscow. This collection, composed of nearly 2,000 objects, dating from the ii e century of our era up to the Middle Ages, had been temporarily transferred to the Allard Pierson Museum by four Crimea museums shortly before Annexation by Russia, in March 2014.
Violation of international law
The four museums of Crimea had therefore launched a legal action to force the Allard Pierson Museum to make the collection. In 2016, a Dutch court felt that these objects had to be returned to Ukraine, stressing that Crimea was not considered an autonomous state. Crimean museums had appealed this decision. The case could now be brought to the Supreme Court of the Netherlands.
“We do not only recover museum pieces”, but also “relics testifying to our millennial history,” reacted Tuesday in a video, after the judgment rendered by the Court of Appeal of Amsterdam, the head of Ukrainian diplomacy, Dmyro Kouleba. During the trial, “all the falsifications and the Russian manipulations” resulted in a “fiasco”, he concluded.
If the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelensky, also welcomed a “victory” for his country, the Russian inquiry committee felt that the Dutch justice had acted under “the political situation” only, and the Russian Ministry of Culture denounced a violation of international law.