Hague Protocol 1954

The Convention imposes two main obligations. In peacetime, States must prepare the protection of their heritage: inventories, safeguarding measures, training of military personnel. In time of conflict, they must refrain from using cultural property for military purposes and from attacking it, except in cases of imperative military necessity.

It establishes a distinctive emblem, the blue and white shield, which may be affixed to monuments, museums, archives and repositories of property. It also provides for a special protection regime for a limited number of refuges.

Armed conflicts are one of the main sources of trafficking. Looted museums, archaeological sites dug in haste and scattered collections feed an underground market that ends up in salerooms and on platforms.

That is why OIMAP directives require enhanced vigilance for property from conflict zones or occupied territories, and systematically consult the BIOP database for these provenances.

The Hague Convention protects cultural property during conflicts; the 1970 UNESCO Convention fights trafficking in normal times; the 1995 UNIDROIT Convention organises restitution before the judges. These three instruments complement one another.

In practice, the same object can fall under several texts: a statue looted from a museum during a conflict, illegally exported and then sold to a good-faith buyer falls under all three.