[MSN] Italy Threatens Sanctions Against Museum

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Italy Threatens Sanctions Against Museum

By ARIEL DAVID
The Associated Press
Tuesday, July 10, 2007; 2:36 PM

ROME -- Italy's culture minister said Tuesday that he has sent the J. Paul Getty Museum a proposal to resolve a dispute over allegedly looted antiquities, and threatened the Los Angeles museum with sanctions if a deal is not reached by the end of this month.

"I have again written to the Getty offering a final proposal for dialogue and agreement," Minister Francesco Rutelli said.

Officials at the ministry said they did not have details on the new proposal. The minister spoke about the dispute while visiting a newly restored church in the east coast town of Fano.

Italian authorities have launched a worldwide campaign to recover looted treasures and are at odds with Getty over antiquities they say were illegally dug up and smuggled out of the country, despite laws making all antiquities found in Italy state property.

The museum said last year it would return 26 disputed objects _ including sculptures, pottery and frescoes _ but Italian officials are demanding an additional 21. The Getty museum denies knowingly buying any illegally obtained objects and has said it remains open to resuming discussions with the ministry on contested pieces.

If a deal is not reached by July, "a real conflict will begin, a real embargo, that is the interruption of cultural and scientific collaboration between Italy and that museum," Rutelli said. Ministry officials have said that would include suspension of work with Italian institutions on research, excavations, exhibits or artwork loans.

The negotiations have been stalled for months mainly over one of the most prized and contested treasures, the "Statue of a Victorious Athlete" _ a Greek bronze believed to date from around 300 B.C.

The museum believes the bronze was found in international waters in 1964 off Italy's eastern coast and that Rome has no claim on it. The Italians say the statue was pulled up by fishermen near Fano and that even if the find occurred in international waters the statue was still brought into the country and then exported illegally.

In its efforts to recover looted antiquities said to have been sold to museums worldwide, Italy signed separate deals with New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art and Boston's Museum of Fine Arts for the return of a total of 34 artifacts _ including Hellenistic silverware, Etruscan vases and Roman statues _ in exchange for loans of other treasures.

Italy has also placed former Getty curator Marion True and art dealer Robert Hecht on trial in Rome charged with knowingly receiving dozens of archaeological treasures that were stolen from private collections or dug up illicitly. The two Americans deny wrongdoing.

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