Putin and Merkel in spat over German treasure looted by Soviets during the war

[Larry1]

Plans for the German chancellor and the Russian president to jointly open an exhibition at St Petersburg's Hermitage museum tonight have been cancelled by the Russian government because Mrs Merkel planned to call for the return of the artefacts in her speech. One of the highlights of the exhibition is a hoard of 81 gold pieces including gold plate, rings and ornate bowls that has never been seen in public since the end of the war.

The Eberswalde Hoard, discovered during an excavation north-east of Berlin in 1913, was removed from a museum in the German capital by Soviet troops and transported to Moscow as war booty.
German government spokesman Georg Streiter said Mrs Merkel had planned to use her speech at the opening of the exhibition to call for the return of the art in accordance with international law.
The spokesman said Russia had cancelled the opening speeches by the two leaders, blaming a lack of time.

For decades, Germany has demanded the return of the hoard, which is regarded as one of the most important discoveries from the European Bronze Age. Russia has declined to return the artefacts, regarding their seizure as part of reparations for the damage inflicted during Hitler's invasion of the Soviet Union.

The exhibition has been jointly organised by Russian and German museums, who donated more than 1,700 objects to create a portrait of the Bronze Age. Titled "Bronze Age, Europe without borders", the exhibition will be on display in St Petersburg until September.

Hermann Parzinger, president of the Prussian Cultural Heritage Foundation, one of the institutions that took part in creating the show, said the "good and trusting" cooperation between German and Russian experts in bringing together the exhibits provided a sound basis for future collaboration.
In a statement issued before the spat emerged, he said: "The German public must unfortunately remain deprived of the excellent exhibition on the Bronze Age, while the question of war-related cultural assets remains unresolved on a political level. "But this exhibition will be conducive to finding a solution."

... In recent decades Russia and Germany have enjoyed close ties built on commercial links such as the Nord Stream gas pipeline under the Baltic Sea and strong personal relationships between the two countries' leaders. Over the past year, however, relations between the two countries have soured. Russia was angered by Germany's draconian attitude to the financial crisis in Cyprus, where many Russians had invested money.

In March this year, Russia's state prosecutor raided the St Petersburg office of the Konrad Adenauer Foundation, a think tank associated with Mrs Merkel's party, the Christian Democrats. On the same day Russian authorities also raided the Moscow offices of the Friedrich Ebert Foundation, another German think tank. Critics of Mr Putin regarded the raids as part of a crackdown on NGOs aimed at stifling political dissent.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/germany/10134758/Spat-between-Angela-Merkel-and-Vladimir-Putin-over-German-treasure.html

What are your thoughts?

[ML]

What is the value of being involved in wars if you don't get to keep the land and booty that you gain/capture?

What's with all this giving back of treasure, moving boundaries back to pre-war lines, helping rebuild economies, etc.??

It makes it seem like wars serve no purpose!!

[Boethius]

It should go back to Germany as there is less chance of it "disappearing" into a private collection in Germany.  However, given the German looting of Russian artifacts, particularly the Amber Room, I can understand the Russian perspective, and it is a little precious for the Germans to turn this into a diplomatic incident.

[ML]

The Amber room has been returned to its original state (but with different Amber).  I understand a German gas company paid for it.  Also, as I understand, the original Amber pieces have,to date, not been located.

[Boethius]

Yes, but it is not the original, merely a replica.  It's akin to replacing the Mona Lisa with a copy.


There are literally thousands of pieces looted from Russia from outside St. Petersburg that are still missing, even though the German government has resources dedicated to the recovery of looted treasures.

[tfcrew]

 

Mrs Merkel planned to call for the return ..of 81 gold pieces.

What are your thoughts?

Was there a sports championship ring involved?

[SANDRO43]

Were we to reclaim all the art treasures lifted from our country over the past centuries, many world museums would suddenly suffer from a serious decline in their exhibits .

A special branch of our Carabinieri is their Nucleo Tutela Patrimonio Culturale, a.k.a.  the Art Squad.

Their main activity is tracing illegally acquired artifacts, usually from 'night-owl' diggers, unscrupulous art dealers and rapacious museum managers, thereafter providing evidence of misconduct that permits initiating actions for their retrieval.

One of their most famous recent accomplishments involved the return in 2006 of the beautiful Euphronios krater - a perfectly preserved Greek masterpiece from the Vth century BC stolen in 1971 from an Etruscan tomb near Cerveteri and acquired by the Metropolitan Museum of Art in 1972.

Granted, we suffer from an overabundance of art treasures in our museum cellars which cannot be put on show for lack of exhibition space.

A brand-new law was enacted just a few days ago that permits our museums to loan such treasures to other international museums for 10-20 years - and, obviously, a monetary consideration .

I am particularly pleased because 2 years ago our previous government solicited novel ideas for raising funds, and I suggested selling part of our enormous trove of amphorae and oil lanterns gathering dust. I thought that buying for, say, € 200 a certified antique piece could interest many world art lovers not in the same league of big museums.

I received a reply email thanking me but saw no action on it until now - although not quite the same idea, it's a step forward IMO.
 

[Fashionista]

What are your thoughts?

Looks like a nice set for artifact exchange between Russia and Germany. Sort of like prisoner exchange