I have just heard from Jean-Ives Marin, President of ICOM Comite National
Francais that France has now ratified the 1970 UNESCO "Convention on the
Means of Prohibiting and Preventing the Illicit Import, Export and
Transfer of Ownership of Cultural Property".

France is the fifth European Union state to ratify the convention
following Italy (1973), Greece, 1981, Portugal (1985) and Spain (1986).

Warmest congratulations are due to ICOM France and the ICOM Headquarters
Secretariat for their considerable efforts in persuading the French
Ministries of Culture and Foreign Affairs to take this important
practical (and symbolic) step in the fight against international art
crime.

This also means that two out of of the world's four leading art
international centres for the art and antiquities trade - the United
States (ratified 1983) and France - are now parties to the 1970
Convention, making the position of the other two (the United Kingdom and
Switzerland), which are still defying international opinion on the need to
adopt international measures against illicit trafficking, look even more
exposed both in terms of their international image, and to increased ever
more material of dubious (or worse) origin.


Patrick J. Boylan

City University, Frobisher Crescent, Barbican, London EC2Y 8HB, UK;
phone: +44-171-477.8750, fax:+44-171-477.8887; e-mail: [log in to unmask]
World Wide Web site: http://www.city.ac.uk/artspol/index.html


N.B.: The Convention's text is available through:
http://www.tufts.edu/departments/fletcher/multi/cultural.html