For Ukraine, For Their Freedom and Ours!, a French nonprofit, has filed a case with the Worldwide Felony Court docket (ICC), accusing Russia of the “systematic, widespread, and arranged” looting of Ukrainian cultural heritage.
The group, which describes itself as “dedicated to supporting the Ukrainian trigger within the face of Russia’s warfare of aggression,” submitted the grievance on July 11. It requires arrest warrants to be issued for Russian president Vladimir Putin and eight high-ranking Russian officers, claiming that mass plundering because the begin of the 2022 invasion was “deliberate on the highest degree of the Russian state.”
“After a prolonged investigation, we have been capable of decide the modus operandi of this predation … and determine the primary perpetrators of acts geared toward appropriating Ukrainian cultural heritage,” the group stated in a press release. “These acts will be labeled as warfare crimes below worldwide regulation. Led by Vladimir Putin, the implementation of this coverage of systematic plunder entails senior officers from the Russian Ministry of Tradition, administrators of main museums, and even Sergei Naryshkin, the pinnacle of Russian international intelligence.”
In June, UNESCO verified injury to 501 cultural websites in Ukraine brought on by Russian forces since February 2022. These embrace 151 non secular websites, 262 buildings of historic and/or inventive curiosity, 34 museums, 33 monuments, 18 libraries, one archive, and two archaeological websites.
For Ukraine, For Their Freedom and Ours! stated that Russia’s invasion has “resulted within the largest plundering of cultural heritage in Europe throughout worldwide armed battle because the Second World Warfare.”
“Our legal professionals are assured in how the prosecutor’s workplace will deal with the knowledge” submitted to the ICC, Christian Castagna, the nonprofit’s advocacy supervisor, advised ARTnews.
In 2023 the ICC issued two arrest warrants for Putin over the unlawful wartime deportation of Ukrainian kids to Russia, following a marketing campaign by For Ukraine, For Their Freedom and Ours! Ukraine’s human rights commissioner stated the warrants helped return almost 400 of the 19,546 kids reported as kidnapped.
“In my view, after the 2 arrest warrants have been issued by the ICC for Putin, it has develop into simpler to return kids,” Dmytro Lubinets, the commissioner, advised reporters on the time. Nevertheless, he added that deportations have been nonetheless ongoing.
Russia, in the meantime, has argued that it’s relocating Ukrainian kids to guard them from being deserted in a battle zone.
“The content material of the communication we submitted to the ICC on July 11 may be very exact and well-argued concerning how Moscow ready the looting of museums and the erasure of Ukrainian cultural identification,” Castagna stated Monday. “Our work, in its spirit and conduct, is similar to that which we carried out concerning the compelled abductions of Ukrainian kids.”
Earlier this 12 months, in Could, Castagna and a bunch of arts professionals referred to as on the Worldwide Council of Museums (ICOM)—a nongovernmental group that units business requirements—to eject Russia for violating its code of ethics.
In an open letter printed in Le Monde, the group stated it will take ICOM to courtroom in France, the place the NGO is headquartered, if it didn’t take away Russia.
“As a result of ICOM is an NGO topic to French laws,” Castagna advised ARTnews on the time, “if it doesn’t comply with what’s written in its statutes, its members can demand that ICOM’s govt board respects its statutes and dismisses Russia for violating its code of ethics.”
On Monday, he added, “For the reason that publication of the [open letter in Le Monde], we’ve got seen the reluctance of many professionals to face as much as Russians who don’t respect ICOM’s working guidelines. They don’t wish to combine political battle with cultural actions. However the erasure of Ukrainian cultural identification is certainly a neo-colonialist political mission.”
“It’s now a matter of fueling the controversy in such a approach that artwork professionals take inventory of the crimes dedicated by Russia,” Castagna stated.
