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description= The Hunt for Looted Antiquities in the World s Museums;
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r the khums tax imposed by abu sayyaf s department was often quite arbitrary not surprisingly this led to conflicts between looters and their isis tax collectors remarkably one of these disputes is detailed in the newly released documents the records show that isis authorities concluded that abu sayyaf had used his position of power to extort looters and kidnap one of their children when they refused to pay isis levies remarkably the documents seized from sayyaf include direct testimony from some of his victims who filed a complaint with the islamic state s general supervising committee a redacted translation of the testimony as well as images of the original document is included in the forfeiture complaint what follows is an account based upon these records in 2013 seven women from the village of al duwayr spent eight months digging with pick axes in the al salihiyyah archaeological site outside damascus there are two locations named al salihiyyah in syria but as paul barford notes in the comments below given the context this likely refers to the site outside deir ez zor where abu sayyaf was based during the illicit dig they found a cache of gold and other ancient relics the women asked a male relative whose name is redacted to sell the finds but he could not reach an agreed upon price with local merchants who offered up to 180 000 it is not clear what currency is being discussed but else where the records note many deals were transacted in u s dollars abu sayyaf s deputy abu layth learned of the find and came to collect the isis khums tax 20 of the discovery s value he put the value of their discovery at just 70 000 and offered to buy it all when the looters refused the low ball price abu layth attempted to take one fifth of the find in lieu of the tax that too was refused by the women days later layth and five members of the islamic state arrived at the house of one of the looters in masks and toting guns abu layth brandishing a pistol demanded to know where the gold was the women said it had already been taken to turkey at that point one of the isis men grabbed a 15 year old boy abu layth stated i will take the boy to al raqqah and i will not bring him back until you bring the gold the boy testified about his abduction saying he was blindfolded beaten in the back of the vehicle threatened with a pistol to his head and then held for 15 days in al raqqah in his own testimony abu layth acknowledged he had no experience with antiquities he had worked for the ministry of natural resources for nine months and had previously sold clothes and food abu layth testified that he was given 130 000 to purchase the relics but offered only 70 000 to the looters merchants in turkey who he communicated with via mediators said the finds could be worth as much as 200 000 he said he had arrested the boy at the order of his boss abu sayyaf having heard the testimony the islamic state s general supervising committee issued its ruling abu sayyaf should fire abu layth hire own responsible men and apologize to the family for arresting the boy without justification below are links to the federal complaint and attachments containing the documents it references i welcome your additional thoughts in the comments section federal complaint https www documentcloud org documents 3239356 forfeiture complaint stamped copy 12 15 16 html attachments to the complaint https www documentcloud org documents 3239355 attachments to forfeiture complaint html share this share on x opens in new window x share on facebook opens in new window facebook share on linkedin opens in new window linkedin share on reddit opens in new window reddit email a link to a friend opens in new window email print opens in new window print like loading 12 comments posted in news tagged abu sayyaf antiquities deir ezzor fbi isis islamic state khums tax looting syria us attorney s office the end of the beginning nga returns kushan buddha and two kapoor objects posted on september 18 2016 6 comments on monday the national gallery of australia returned three more antiquities to india in light of evidence much of it first made public here that they had been stolen from temples or archaeological sites smuggled out of india and sold with false ownership histories by dealers now under criminal investigation in a ceremony in the canberra museum s asian gallery the australian arts minister mitch fifield handed over to his indian counterpart mahesh sharma two sculptures purchased from the disgraced manhattan antiquities dealer subhash kapoor who is currently standing trial in chennai india for his role as the alleged mastermind of an international smuggling ring a third sculpture a kushan era sculpture of the seated buddha purchased from manhattan antiquities dealer nancy wiener and once a centerpiece of the australian collection is being quietly returned out of the public eye we first revealed the sculpture s false ownership history in february 2015 and wrote about it in the australian with arts reporter michaela boland the three sculptures join the museum s dancing shiva an ardhanarishvara from the art gallery of new south wales and other objects returned in recent years the results of a looting controversy that has shaken australia s museums and raised far reaching questions about their collecting practices some 280 additional antiquities at the nga alone have been identified as having a clouded ownership history by an unprecedented provenance review that is on going the australian returns underscore the growing risks faced by museums and collectors who purchased asian antiquities in recent decades from what they believed to be respectable dealers and auction houses as we ve chronicled here since 2012 on going criminal investigations by authorities in the united states india pakistan cambodia thailand and beyond have slowly unraveled the transnational smuggling networks that supplied those dealers sources hint that the sweeping consequences of those investigations will soon become far clearer monday s australian returns therefore are best understood as the end of the beginning phase of those investigations not the end kushan buddha the kushan sculpture of a seated buddha was likely returned out of the public eye on monday because it no longer belongs to the museum in march 2015 the museum announced that it had returned it for a refund to nancy wiener the new york owner of the wiener gallery who sold the statue in 2007 for 1 08 million wiener in turn agreed to donate it to india at the time of the sale wiener said the sculpture had belonged to an englishman named ian donaldson who claimed to have purchased it while posted in hong kong between 1964 and 1966 she provided the museum with a 1985 certificate of ownership signed by donaldson it was the only record of sculpture s ownership history but the museum did not attempt to contact donaldson instead the nga obtained a search certificate from the art loss register saying the sculpture was not in its database of stolen objects as we ve noted in the past such declarations are largely useless for antiquities yet that was the extent of the due diligence the museum conducted i first raised questions about the buddha in 2012 after a source contacted me suggesting the statue s ownership history had been falsified the nga eventually released documents supporting that claim and belatedly contacted the expert who had first authenticated the sculpture donald stadtner stadtner raised further questions about the sculpture s origins claiming in an email to museum officials that british collector douglas latchford had boasted in a meeting that he had found nancy a provenance for a related kushan buddha that wiener sold to singapore s asian civilizations museum through his attorneys latchford has denied ever meeting stadtner the return of the nga s seated buddha will put increased pressure others to reveal the ownership history of similar objects singapore s asian civilizations museum has refused to disclose the provenance that wiener provided for a very similar sculpture of a seated buddha wiener has displayed images of a third kushan buddha on her gallery s website the current location of that buddha is not known wiener has not responded to repeated requests for comment in the past another similar buddha is on display at the carlos museum at emory university that seated buddha was acquired as a gift of the nathan rubin ida ladd family foundation which is known to have acquired objects from kapoor kapoor objects the two other objects returned monday are both from subhash kapoor and were linked to objects stolen from indian temples by researcher vijay kumar of the indian pride project in 2005 kapoor sold both objects to the nga for 1 5 million one was an 1800 year old limestone carving depicting a scene from the life of buddha kapoor told the museum the sculpture of the buddha s life had been in a private japanese collection until 1999 but in july we published this photo of the showing the unrestored sculpture as it appears in kapoor s archives soon after it was stolen by thieves the second kapoor object due to be returned in the ceremony monday was a 1000 year old stone goddess pratyangira or lion lady kapoor claimed the sculpture had been in the collection of his onetime girlfriend selina mohamed since 1990 but as we first reported in july 2016 photos and records found in kapoor s files show the pratyangira was in mumbai india in 2002 kumar has linked the object to vriddhachlam the same temple that the art gallery of new south wales shiva was taken from investigators believe kapoor obtained the two objects from a chennai art dealer named deena dayalan who has operated an art gallery there since 1965 and is suspected of being a major player in the theft and smuggling of antiquities from the region indian authorities raided dayalan s properties in july and seized substantial evidence that may have led to monday s returns share this share on x opens in new window x share on facebook opens in new window facebook share on linkedin opens in new window linkedin share on reddit opens in new window reddit email a link to a friend opens in new window email print opens in new window print like loading 6 comments posted in news tagged asian civilizations museum deena dayalan kushan buddha mahesh sharma mitch fifield national gallery of australia selina mohamed subhash kapoor vijay kumar the missing link subhash kapoor s suppliers in india are finally getting rolled up posted on july 3 2016 3 comments update september 2016 indian media report that a temple thief who worked for deena dayalan has been accused of murdering a fellow thief after a dispute over 13 idols they took from a temple in 2005 in a series of aggressive police raids over the past month indian authorities have disrupted a large network of alleged thieves and smugglers that for decades has plundered ancient temples from chennai to mumbai to supply the international art market the raids started on may 31st with the arrest of three men at a chennai warehouse or godown in the indian parlance the men were employees of an 84 year old art dealer named deena dayalan who has operated a chennai art gallery since 1965 indian and american authorities believe dayalan has long been a major player in the theft and smuggling of antiquities from south india deena dayalan via indian express dayalan disappeared after the raid but turned himself in a few days later he is said to have confessed during an interrogation and listed his associates and storage facilities across india subsequent raids on his properties uncovered hundreds of artifacts including 49 bronzes 71 stone carvings and 96 paintings and hundreds of smaller objects including ivory and wood carvings lamps figurines and ornamental pillars as reported by frontline the hindu newspaper s weekly magazine policemen entering dayalan s house were stunned by the scope of his haul it looked like a temple one investigator told frontline besides the idols and artefacts there were pamphlets and books on temple idols and archtecture the pillars of his house could be from some old temples there were wooden sculptures and two elephant heads at the entrance said an officer the rai d was not dayalan s first run in with the law frontline reported the dealer was accused of being behind the 2005 break in at the ancient sri narum poonathar temple at paluvoor village in tirunelveli where 13 bronze idols were stolen after the theft an accomplice was murdered in a dispute over efforts to extract gold from two and a half foot bronze nataraja which was sawn in half in the process dayalan was released on bail and the case is on going update 7 4 16 the tamil nadu idol wing has seized 200 objects from lakshmi narayanan an associate of dayalan authorities found 56 were metal idols 103 stone idols and 47 temple vahanas decorative platforms used to carry the deity in processions the hindu reports narayanan was arrested and will face charges of idol theft the police raids have now spread beyond tamil nadu are likely to continue in the coming weeks that authorities unravel the smuggling network and sort through voluminous evidence authorities have identified the courier service that dayalan used to transport objects within india and seized his laptop a desktop computer and storage drives he allegedly labeled his stolen artifacts as modern handicrafts before they were smuggled out of india through mumbai where an unnamed boss in the illicit trade remains at large the investigation promises to give investigators what one indian paper called a glimpse of the man s murky business with several smuggling cartels across the globe as the hindu noted in an editorial the meticulously organised nature of this shadowy business hints at the deep and vast network of idol thieves who have plied their trade across not only tamil nadu but numerous other indian states and even broader territories of south and south east asia the kapoor link investigators are still looking for links between dayalan and one of his prominent american clients subhash kapoor the manhattan antiquities dealer now standing trial in india for selling stolen antiquities to museums around the world we have not got clinching evidence to prove his link with the international idol smuggler subhash kapoor one investigator told the times of india we can help the following document links dhayalan to kapoor and hints at the extensive business relationship they are believed to have had the document records dayalan s 2007 request for a payment of usd 11 400 from kapoor s nimbus import export through selva export one of the chennai export companies they used to transport artifacts it is still unclear whether that amount was paid what object s were purchased for the sum and where those objects are today but authorities have already identified dayalan as the source of one stolen kapoor object that has already been returned to india the art ...
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