AMSTERDAM (AP) – A trove of historical artefacts being held by an Amsterdam museum must be returned to Ukraine and not to four museums in Crimea that loaned them out for a 2014 exhibition, a Dutch court ruled Wednesday.
The decision goes a long way to resolving a cultural tug-of-war triggered by Russia’s annexation of Crimea.
While the Amsterdam court’s decision was a clear victory for Ukraine, the court said that the treasures should remain in storage in Amsterdam pending the outcome of a possible appeal.
Russia’s 2014 annexation of Crimea left the treasures in a legal limbo as both the Crimean museums and Ukraine demanded their return by Amsterdam’s Allard Pierson Museum, which had borrowed them for a 2014 exhibition that opened a month before the annexation.
In a statement, the court said that the claim that the artefacts are “part of the cultural heritage of Crimea or of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea was incorrect, as neither is a sovereign state.”