Dear Mailing list Subscribers,

It has been a very exiting, and often shocking year from a cultural property
perspective (and not just from that perspective).

May this year a museum guard was killed while on duty in a museum in
Guatemala, the Anna Amalia Library suffered severe damage in a fire, the
Victoria & Albert museum in London was victimized during opening hours three
times in as many months, it was the year of internal thefts by curators in
France, Denmark, Sweden, the USA, and The Netherlands, plus by a museum
guard in the USA, too many museums suffered thefts from vulnerable display
cases. 

It was also the year of the shocking daytime theft of two Munch paintings in
Oslo. We need to straighten something here: armed robberies are not at all a
new phenomenon. These have occurred several times ever since the early
seventies of the 20th century. 

2004 also was the year in which it became very obvious that not only
reputable old auction houses very often are abused to sell stolen art. They
have experienced strong competition from on-line auction houses. Several
times E-bay turned out to be market place for stolen cultural property. 

In the year of the Athens Olympics the Parthenon Marbles discussion
highlighted without the result desired by the Greeks. Discussing the
Parthenon - and NOT the Elgin - marbles means emotion, and not reason. Lack
of reason was most of all shown by a Netherlands museum director stating on
national television that Greeks have no right to claim the marbles because
Greece did not exist when Thomas Bruce, Lord of Elgin, took the marbles. A
shameful statement one might want to erase from television files: Greece was
occupied by the Ottoman empire in those days. 

Museum, library, and archive staff seem inclined to forget about incidents
that take place. It is for this reason that we have made up an index of our
2004 mailinglist messages:
http://www.cpprot.net/2004reports.pdf

Print and read it!

Do forward this index to decision makers in your cultural institutions, to
governmental budget providers, to your boards and sponsors, and make them
aware that budget cuts in security in the long term always will cost a lot
of money!

Happy, Secure, and Safe New Year to all of!

Ton Cremers

_________________________
Museum Security Network
http://www.museum-security.org/
[log in to unmask]
_________________________
 

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