SWANSEA, Wales, Nov. 20 /PRNewswire/ -- David Gill, archaeologist, reflects on the review of the agreement on archaeological material from Italy.

In November 2009, the US Cultural Property Advisory Committee (CPAC) reviewed the Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with Italy. This agreement relates to "the Imposition of Import Restrictions on Archaeological Material Representing the Pre-Classical, Classical and Imperial Roman Periods of Italy." CPAC was looking at Article 2 to consider the actions taken by Italian authorities to reduce the problem of looting.

Italy has been active in its pursuit of those who have handled archaeological material that has been removed illicitly from archaeological sites on Italian sovereign territory. One dealer of antiquities has been convicted and another is currently on trial in Rome; the latter has been linked to material returned from North American museums to Italy.

Italy has been successful in gaining the return of well over 100 antiquities from North American public and private collections. Such action seems to be proving a major deterrent to the organized looting of archaeological sites. A Carabinieri report on the level of looting in 2006 has suggested that there had been a decrease of some 10 per cent over the number of incidents in the 1990s.

Auction-houses in London and New York have been linked to recently-surfaced antiquities. In October 2008, one auction-house had to withdraw a set of lots as the pieces could apparently be identified from images seized in a police raid on the Geneva warehouse of a dealer. The same dossier of photographs seems to have led to the seizure of two further pots at a New York auction-house in October 2009.

Italy's actions to counter the looting of archaeological sites have been celebrated in a series of public exhibitions in Rome. One that opened at the Castel Sant'Angelo in the fall of 2009 celebrated 40 years of the work of the Comando Carabinieri per la Tutela del Patrimonio Culturale. Many of the items probably removed from archaeological sites in ancient Etruria have been put on permanent public display in the Villa Giulia, Rome.

Italy has acknowledged the positive co-operation of North American museums by arranging a series of high profile loans of archaeological material to fill the gaps left by the returned material.

http://lootingmatters.blogspot.com/2009/11/cpac-review-of-mou-with-italy.html

SOURCE Looting Matters

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