ABSTRACT
This study explores how Russia’s invasion and occupation of Ukraine has affected cultural property crime and how cultural property criminals have responded to those practical, social, political and economic changes. To do so, this online ethnography draws on netnographic data from 184 artefact-hunters across Ukraine, Russia, Belarus, Greece, Germany, Belgium, the United Kingdom, the United States and Canada, two artefact-dealers and one violent political operator, whose discussions spanned 19 online communities. It examines the legal fictions and legal nihilism of antiquities looters; the criminal operations of antiquities looters and antiquities traffickers in the occupied territories of Ukraine; the international networks of artefact-hunters that facilitate the trading of equipment and antiquities, plus the movement of the artefact-hunters themselves and the conduct of their criminal operations. Thereby, it documents the pollution of Western markets with tainted cultural goods from the occupied territories of Ukraine and elsewhere in Eastern Europe and the contribution of Western consumers to the conflict economy.
ABSTRACT
In Central Asia, archaeology has become a renewed focus of attention in the context of the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). The infrastructure projects associated with the BRI could have a marked impact on the preservation of archaeological heritage, local understanding and use of cultural heritage. With reference to a case study centred on Kazakhstan, the paper examines the complications posed by the BRI in achieving the balance between economic development and tangible heritage preservation. While analysing weaknesses of the current legal cultural framework, it suggests that the archaeological custodianship, both local and international, should be encouraged.
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