Dzheppar: Russia invests heavily in delaying Scythian gold trial

According to the deputy minister, the Russian Federation deliberately delays the trial "as if it did not exist officially."

"They have hired one of the strongest and most expensive [law firms] in the Netherlands, which once protected Gazprom's interests. Therefore, of course, they will try to delay this trial as much as possible and no expense, resource, attention is spared," First Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine Emine Dzheppar said on the air of DOM Ukrainian TV channel.

At the same time, according to Dzheppar, the Ukrainian position in this dispute is very strong from the legal point of view. "Ukraine has big chances because the conventions and the legal framework, on which Ukrainian defense is based, say that the Scythian gold collection consists of the artifacts of several museums, five museums specifically: the National Museum of the History of Ukraine and four Crimean museums. This is the property of Ukraine, not of Crimean museums, which actually have been and are a part of Ukraine. This is the property of Ukraine," she said.

As reported, the collection of Scythian gold had been delivered to the Allard Pearson Museum in Amsterdam as part of the exhibition entitled “Crimea – the Gold and Secrets of the Black Sea” prior to the illegal annexation of Crimea by the Russian Federation.

On December 14, 2016, the Amsterdam District Court ruled that the exhibits of the Crimean museums had to be returned to Ukraine. The judgment was delivered pursuant to the UNESCO convention, according to which the art treasures should be returned to a sovereign state, which provided them for temporary exhibition.

On March 28, 2017, the Amsterdam Court of Appeal received an appeal against the ruling from the representatives of Crimean museums.

On March 11, 2019, the Amsterdam Court of Appeal started to consider an appeal in the case of the return of the "Scythian gold" collection to Ukraine.

In July 2019, the Amsterdam Court of Appeal postponed delivery of a final judgment in the "Scythian gold" case.

Currently, the "Scythian gold" collection is kept in the Allard Pearson Museum in Amsterdam.

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