Italian Cultural Institute in Zamalek to host 'International Cooperation on Trafficking & Restitution of Cultural Property' conference on May 10

CAIRO – 5 May 2022: On May 10 at 4:30 p.m., the theater of the Italian Cultural Institute in Zamalek will host the “International Cooperation on Trafficking & Restitution of Cultural Property” conference, which is being held by the Institute in cooperation with the Mexican Embassy in Cairo and the Supreme Council of Antiquities, and will be attended by the Italian ambassador and the Mexican ambassador in Cairo.

It is noteworthy that the UNESCO Convention on the Means of Prohibiting and Preventing the Illicit Import, Export and Transfer of Ownership of Cultural Property, which entered into force on April 24, 1972, establishes the duty of every state to protect the heritage represented by cultural property in its territory from the dangers of looting, clandestine excavations, and illegal export.

It also decided an obligation to combat these practices in every possible way, especially with regard to stopping it during its occurrence, eliminating its causes, and providing the necessary assistance to ensure the return of the property in question.

On February 16, 2004, the Cairo Declaration on the Protection of Cultural Property was issued. The National Committee for International Humanitarian Law at the Egyptian Ministry of Justice and the International Committee of the Red Cross organized the conference in coordination with the League of Arab States and UNESCO.

The conference's invitation - Twitter

The agreement signed by Egypt and Italy in the field of importing smuggled antiquities in 2008 was a major reason for retrieving 195 antiquities and 21,660 coins from Italy in 2018, in addition to a large number of other pieces over the following years.