The Call of Namur, 2015
At the European level, the 47 ministers in charge of heritage at the Council of Europe, meeting in Namur at the 6th Conference of Ministers of Cultural Heritage (22-24 April 2015) launched the Namur Call.
This Appeal of the 47 Member States of the Council of Europe Condemns the deliberate destruction of cultural heritage and the illicit trafficking of cultural property, Calling for international solidarity to prevent and repress them and deciding to work to strengthen European cooperation, including legal instruments, with relevant partners including the United Nations and the European Union.
Ministers stressed support for UNESCO’s actions and welcomed the commitment of civil society (ICOM, ICOMOS, Europa Nostra, etc.).
Declaration of Namur; Cultural heritage on the 21ste Towards a common strategy for Europe»
The European Commission identified a number of urgent problems in combating illicit trafficking in cultural property, including a lack of coherence in legislation between Member States, legal terminology and definitions and a lack of information and data on trafficking in cultural property. It is thus responsible for taking steps to build a robust data set for policy development and to act effectively in collaboration with other international organizations.
To this end, the European Commission is already working closely with a range of organisations to strengthen the regulatory environment.
In the context of the preparation of a Directive on the fight against terrorism, France stated that it considered the reference to illicit trafficking of cultural property to be insufficient in a recital and argued with Italy for the inclusion in an article of a specific offence against cultural property in connection with the fight against the financing of cultural property. terrorism, which would thus be a counterpart to the provision which may soon be incorporated into national law.
The European Union also addresses the fight against illicit trafficking in its relations with developing countries.
Finally, at the Universal Exhibition in Milan at the end of July 2015, the ministers of the culture of the world gathering 150 States have condemned once again the destruction of heritage and the illicit trafficking that results from it.
On 7 December 2015, by joint letter with his German and Italian colleagues, the Minister for Culture and Communication invited the European Commission to quickly present to the Council and Parliament a proposal for a European regulation to combat in a global way the illicit importation of cultural goods into the EU.
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