“Stolen Memory” is the investigation that led to the creation of the first journalistic platform that collects massive data on illicit trafficking of cultural artifacts from Latin American countries. It is a project of Peruvian digital investigative journalism site Ojo Público, which invited four important media in the region to participate in a transnational and…
An exchange of arms and art is shown by a new reportage of Domenico Quirico, and was published today in La Stampa (so far available only in Italian). D. Quirico describes the allegedly close connections between ISIS and the ‘ndrangheta in Calabria/Italy, and how the port of Gioia Taura acts as a hub for archaeological…
Robin Symes and Christos Michaelides formed a duo of dealers who dominated the international antiquities market in the 1980s and 1990s. During that period they became the best suppliers of illicit antiquities to the most ‘reputable’ museums, private collections and auction houses. Many of their antiquities came from lower-level dealers such as Giacomo Medici and…
From the confiscated archive of Robin Symes, a Roman marble figurine of a draped goddess at Christie’s forthcoming antiquities auction in New York, October 25th 2016 (lot 92) was identified by Christos Tsirogiannis, who is also member of our committee. Greek police seized the photographs during a 2006 raid on Robin Symes’ villa on the…
Investigators recovered more than 2,000 objects, mostly coins, that they say were offered for sale through auction houses. Greek police have busted what they say is a criminal organisation that has been looting antiquities from ancient sites in the country for the past 10 years and smuggling them out to auction houses and private buyers…
Security guards called police after they saw the 31-year-old tourist use his foot to dig out a chip of marble from the floor of Pompeii’s House of the Small Fountain dating from the first century AD. In May last year, the United States returned to Italy three frescoes taken from Pompeii nearly 60 years ago…
Cyprus plans to organise a series of activities that would kick-start a new criminal law convention to combat illicit trafficking in cultural property, during its Presidency of the Council of Europe, between November 2016 to May 2017, Foreign Minister Ioannis Kasoulides has said. read more
Excavations conducted in the absence of a supervising archaeologist and without proper recording of items, as well as issuing entry tickets by off-duty staff, are among the findings of a probe by the Audit Service into Paphos excavation sites, auditor-general Odysseas Michaelides said in a letter to the Antiquities Department director end of september.…
EAA-Community on the Illicit Trade in Cultural Material 