Spanish police seize €60 million of stolen antique gold items from Ukraine
[;ua]Фото: ReutersPhoto: Reuters
Police in Spain have seized €60 million worth of antique gold items stolen from Ukraine after catching the thieves trying to sell them in Madrid.
Reuters reported this.
According to police, 11 items, mostly jewelry, including necklaces, bracelets, and earrings, date back to the period between the eighth and fourth centuries BC.
The objects were exhibited in one of the Kyiv museums in 2009-2013, and 2016, they were smuggled out of Ukraine, according to the statement of the National Police of Madrid.
According to the police, fake documents were made on the artifacts to make it look like they belonged to the Orthodox Church of Ukraine.
As part of the investigation, which began in 2021, three Spanish nationals and two Ukrainian nationals were arrested after one of the items – a gold belt with ram's heads – was sold at a private auction in Madrid.
As Rubryka reported, on October 20, 14 cultural treasures stolen by Russia from the temporarily occupied territories of Ukraine were unpacked in the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra National Reserve.
It was also reported that the collection of "Scythian gold," exhibited in a museum in the Netherlands when Russia occupied Crimea in 2014, will soon return to Ukraine.
Furthermore, the United States has returned to Ukraine the cultural artifacts of Kyiv that Russian invaders stole from the temporarily occupied regions of the country. The US Customs and Border Protection confiscated the ancient objects.
These artifacts were confiscated for administrative transfer to the Embassy of Ukraine in the United States. During his working visit to the USA, President Volodymyr Zelensky took part in the ceremony of returning cultural values.
U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas and Ms. Oksana Markarova, Ambassador of Ukraine to the U.S., signed the corresponding certificate of transfer of items.
The President thanked everyone involved for their work:
"Every time something is returned to Ukraine, something stolen by the Russians, it means the return of life and justice, which is very important."
For her part, Oksana Markarova noted that the Russians are constantly trying to steal the history of Ukraine and its national identity.
