Jordan asks Canada to seize stolen artifacts

Ma'an
Canada was asked to take custody of a series of scrolls and parchment fragments uncovered in the West Bank and currently on loan to Toronto from the Israel Antiquities Authority.

The ancient artifacts were seized from an East Jerusalem museum in 1967, when Israel occupied the West Bank and illegally annexed Jerusalem. Since the artifacts were uncovered while the area was under Jordanian control between 1948 and 1967, it is the Jordanian government that requested Canada step in and protect the artifacts.

.... Jordan cited the 1954 Hague Convention for the Protection of Cultural Property in the Event of Armed Conflict, to which both Jordan and Canada are signatories. On that basis, Jordan asked that Canada keep the scrolls until the international court can determine their rightful owner.

.........Canada, as a signatory of the cited Hague convention, is legally required “to take into its custody cultural property imported into its territory either directly or indirectly from any occupied territory. This shall either be effected automatically upon the importation of the property or, failing this, at the request of the authorities of that territory.” Full story