\u201cOne million seven hundred thousand items of our cultural heritage were stolen from the occupied territories \u2013 including archaeological artifacts and museum collections. <\/strong>The Russian Federation has unlawfully appropriated them, in clear violation of all norms of international law. In the past, when Russia stole our name and our history, the looted artifacts were displayed in the Hermitage or museums in Moscow.\u00a0Now, they are being openly traded on the black market\u201d, said Tochytskyi. By June 2025, <\/strong>the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (<\/strong>UNESCO) had confirmed<\/a> damage to 501 historical sites,<\/strong> including 34 museums and 2 archaeological sites.<\/p>\n\n\n\n One of the most striking examples of cultural plunder unfolded in the besieged city of Mariupol,<\/strong> where Russian forces descended<\/a> upon the Kuindzhi Art Museum, an institution named after the celebrated Ukrainian painter Arkhip Kuindzhi.<\/strong> Inside its walls, the museum held not just paintings and sculptures, but pieces of national heritage, artworks that had survived revolutions, wars, and the passage of time. Among them were original paintings by Kuindzhi himself, luminous with the colors of Ukrainian landscapes, as well as a seascape by Ilya Aivazovsky,<\/strong> portraits and maritime scenes by Nikolay Dubovsky,<\/strong> and an evocative tribute to Kuindzhi by Georgy Kalmykov.<\/strong> There was also a sculpted bust of Kuindzhi, cast by Beklemishev,<\/strong> and a trio of sacred icons, depictions of Christ Pantocrator, <\/strong>the Virgin Mary with Child, and John the Baptist \u2013 each irreplaceable, each steeped in spiritual and historical weight.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In a matter of days, more than 2,000 artifacts were stripped from the museum and transported to temporary storage in Donetsk.<\/strong> To lend legitimacy to the act, Russian officials actually filmed the looting,<\/strong> framing it as an effort to \u201cprotect the art during military action\u201d. But for Ukrainians, the images told another story, a story of erasure and theft under the guise of preservation. In a move many Ukrainians saw as deeply cynical, the occupation authorities later installed an open-air exhibitionin one of Mariupol\u2019s central parks. But the paintings on display weren\u2019t originals: they were digital replicas of the very works that had been stolen.<\/p>\n\n\n\n When Ukrainian forces liberated Kherson in the autumn of 2022, they returned to a haunting scene: the Kherson Museum of Local Lore had been stripped bare. What was once a proud guardian of regional history and culture now stood hollow, its shelves and display cases emptied by Russian occupation authorities. Ukraine\u2019s Minister of culture, Oleksandr Tkachenko, described the looting as one of the largest thefts<\/a> of museum collections since World War II. \u201cSuch mass removal of cultural values \u200b\u200bfrom the territory of Ukraine by the Russian occupiers will be comparable to the looting of museums during the Second World War and should be qualified accordingly,\u201d he said in a statement<\/a>, quoting the Convention for the Protection of Cultural Property in the Event of Armed Conflict of 1954 (The Hague Convention). \u201cThe actions of the Russian federation are a violation of international law and will result in both the responsibility of the aggressor state and the criminal responsibility of those involved at the national and international level.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Among the stolen treasures was a rare and ancient Sarmatian jewelry set dating back to the 1st<\/sup> century BC, one of the museum\u2019s most prized possessions. According to Elena Yeremenko, the museum\u2019s secretary<\/a>, nearly every section of the building had been ransacked: rooms once filled with imperial-era weapons, coins, medals, and other priceless artifacts were completely cleared out. Only the nature department, with its taxidermy displays, was left untouched. Yeremenko said that the looting occurred in late October 2022. Russian forces used trucks labeled with \u201cRussian Ministry of Emergency Situations\u201d to transport the plundered items.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The Kherson Museum of Regional Art faced a similar fate. Between 30 October and 4 November 2022, as Ukrainian troops launched a counteroffensive, Russian forces emptied the museum\u2019s entire collection into five KamAZ military trucks. Soon after, some photos of the stolen paintings appeared on social media, on display at the Central Museum of Tavrida in Simferopol, in occupied Crimea. But the vast majority of the collection remains missing, its fate unknown.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In November 2022, the representative of the Ukrainian president for the occupied Crimea, Tamila Tasheva,<\/a> said that since 12 May 2022, the beginning of Russia\u2019s occupation of Kherson, \u201cRussian military forces have been conducting targeted raids on the homes of local historians, collectors, and antique shops\u201d. According to Tasheva, \u201cthey seized everything that had even the slightest artistic or historical value. Museum workers were also forced to provide lists of valuable exhibits and individuals for evacuation, including museum employees and their families.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Tasheva told Justice Info that Russian occupation authorities stole more than 15,000 pieces of fine art and unique historical artifacts from occupied territories. And this number is likely to be a significant underestimate. Many museums in war zones remain inaccessible, damaged, or completely destroyed, leaving a cultural void that may never be fully restored.<\/p>\n\n\n\t Art theft in this context is more than just criminal, it is a deliberate act of cultural erasure, said Oksana Semenova, a Ukrainian cultural historian<\/a>. \u201cThe destruction and appropriation of culture is a weapon of war. By erasing memory and stealing heritage, occupiers attempt to rewrite history and replace a nation\u2019s story with their own.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n In June 2023, the European Union imposed sanctions on several individuals involved in the looting of Ukrainian cultural institutions<\/a>. Among them is Tatyana Bratchenko, director of the Kherson regional Museum of Local Lore, who cooperated with Russian occupation authorities and facilitated the removal of the museum\u2019s collections. Natalya Desyatova, the director of the Kherson regional art Museum, has also been sanctioned for her role during the occupation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Sanctions were likewise applied to Natalya Kapustnikova, director of the Mariupol Museum of Local Lore. In its decision<\/a> to impose sanctions on her, the Council of the European Union stated that \u201cshe discovered the location of artworks from the Kuindzhi Art Museum of Mariupol and gave those works willingly over to the Russian authorities, who facilitated their transfer to the Local History Museum of Donetsk\u2026 This was done without the knowledge or consent of the Ukrainian authorities or the director of the Kuindzhi Art Museum. In acting in this capacity, Natalya Kapustnikova is responsible for supporting and implementing actions and policies which undermine and threaten the territorial integrity, sovereignty and independence of Ukraine.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Along with Bratchenko and Kapustnikova, the European Council also imposed sanctions on Andrei Malgin, the general director of the Central Museum of Tavrida in Crimea. The Council\u2019s decision<\/a> states that \u201cart works were transferred from the Kherson Fine Art Museum to the Central Museum of Tavrida in Simferopol, where they are currently kept under his control\u201d, making Malgin responsible for the same offenses.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The sanctions mean that any assets, including bank accounts and properties, held by these individuals in the EU, are to be frozen, and a travel ban to the EU is imposed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n![\"The](\"https:\/\/www.justiceinfo.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/Ukraine_Kuindzhi-museum-destruction_@Alexander-Gore-The-Village.jpg\")
One of the largest thefts since World War II<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n
European sanctions against museum directors<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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