[analyse_image type=”featured” src=”https:\/\/www.artnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/10\/GettyImages-179133563.jpg?w=724″]<\/p>\n
\n\tThe prosecutor\u2019s office of the republic of Crimea and the city of Sevastopol is investigating two unnamed researchers, one of them associated with the Hermitage, for war crimes. The prosecutors say they participated in illegal archaeological expeditions in the territory, which has been occupied by Russia since 2014. The charges could result in sentences of up to 12 years in prison. The second person of interest is a representative of \u201cthe so-called \u2018Institute of Archaeology of Crimea of the Russian Academy of Sciences,\u2019\u201d per the prosecutor.\u00a0 The prosecutor announced the investigation on Monday.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\n\tThe suspects have allegedly been involved since 2014 in unpermitted digs in Medieval Solkhat, in the city of Old Crimea. The digs have destroyed culturally significant parts of the site, say prosecutors. One of the suspects allegedly handed over objects, including elements of the ancient water supply system, bowls, and fragments of dishes, to the State Hermitage Museum in St. Petersburg, which then catalogued them as belonging to its own collection. The museum\u2019s press office did not immediately respond to a request for comment.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\n\tThe Hermitage suspended its expeditions in the occupied territory in June as a result of fuel shortages and continued Ukrainian attacks. Russian archaeological investigations in general are a point of contention between Russia and the larger archaeological community, as ARTnews <\/em>reported at the time. Ukraine does not recognize Russia as the rightful government in Crimea and says that excavations there must be permitted by Ukraine.<\/p>\n \n\tIn April, the Council of the European Union formally sanctioned Mikhail Piotrovsky, the director of the Hermitage since 1992, saying he is a \u201cclose associate\u201d of Russian President Vladimir Putin and has \u201csupported and justified Russia\u2019s war of aggression against Ukraine.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tMany Russians oppose Russia\u2019s war in Ukraine, whose borders include Crimea, and the head of the Hermitage\u2019s contemporary art department resigned in protest over the war in 2022.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n [analyse_source url=”https:\/\/www.artnews.com\/art-news\/news\/war-crimes-illegal-dig-occupied-crimea-hermitage-1234795178\/”]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" [analyse_image type=”featured” src=”https:\/\/www.artnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/10\/GettyImages-179133563.jpg?w=724″] The prosecutor\u2019s office of the republic of Crimea and the city of Sevastopol is investigating two unnamed researchers, one of them associated with the Hermitage, for war crimes. The prosecutors say they participated in illegal archaeological expeditions in the territory, which has been occupied by Russia since 2014. The charges could result […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[61,226],"class_list":["post-2100492","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics","tag-artnews-com","tag-crawlmanager"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2100492","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2100492"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2100492\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2100492"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2100492"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2100492"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}