Museums in occupied Crimea mount legal challenge over return of Scythian Gold to Ukraine – photo
Museums in temporarily Russian-occupied Crimea have filed a claim with the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) challenging a Netherlands Supreme Court ruling that a collection of Scythian Gold should be returned to Ukraine. The museums are insisting that this is a violation of their rights.
Source: The news outlet Suspilne reports that the decision was announced by Mikhail Shvydkoi, the Russian President's Special Representative for International Cultural Cooperation, in a commentary to TASS, a Kremlin-aligned Russian news outlet.
"The limit of opportunities to resolve this issue in the Netherlands has been exhausted, so the museums – I emphasise, the museums of Crimea – have appealed to the European Court of Human Rights. Since the rights of the museums have been violated, they have filed this claim, believing that the court can restore justice," Shvydkoi said.
He added that despite Russia’s withdrawal from the Council of Europe, the museums can still lodge claims as legal entities.
"They signed an agreement with the Dutch Allard Pierson Museum, and in this regard, their rights have been violated. In this regard, I think everything is justified. But this is a very politicised situation, and there are no great hopes. But we have to use this opportunity, because there is no other option," he added.
The Return of the Scythian Gold to Ukraine
At the end of 2023, the Treasury of the National Museum of History of Ukraine presented Crimea: Gold and Secrets of the Black Sea, an exhibition of artefacts from the collection of Scythian Gold which had been kept at the Allard Pierson Museum in the Netherlands since 2014.
The exhibition first opened in 2013 at the Bonn State Museum. It was arranged by the Ukrainian Institute of Archeology of the National Academy of Sciences in cooperation with the Institute of Ancient History of the University of Bonn.
Four Crimean museums loaned artefacts from their collections: the Central Museum of Tavryda, the Kerch Historical and Cultural Reserve, the Chersonesos Tavriia National Reserve, and the Bakhchysarai Historical and Cultural Reserve.
In January 2014, the exhibition moved from Bonn to Amsterdam, where it was displayed until Russia annexed Crimea in late February 2014. The artefacts that belonged to the "mainland" part of Ukraine were sent back, but the exhibits from the Crimean museums, which were now under occupation, remained in Amsterdam. The management of the Crimean museums demanded that their artefacts be transferred to occupied Crimea.
The court battles raged on until 9 June 2023, when the Supreme Court of the Netherlands handed down a final judgment that the exhibits were to be returned to Ukraine. It also required Ukraine to pay €111,689 for the storage of the collection, but the Allard Pierson Museum cancelled the debt on 22 November 2023.
Until Crimea is liberated, the collection of Scythian Gold, which comprises 565 artefacts, will be temporarily stored in the Treasury at the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra, the Monastery of the Caves in Kyiv.
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