Cultural Property, the Palermo Convention, and Transnational Organized Crime

Abstract: The international community is concerned about criminal activity involving cultural property and is promoting the use of the United Nations Convention against Transnational Organized Crime to combat looting and trafficking of cultural property. This article discusses how the Convention may be applied, outlines some of the intentions of UN member states with regard to cultural property crime, and the role of the UN Office on Drugs and Crime. It is suggested that cultural property stakeholders should scrutinize this developing effort, particularly in the areas of UNTOC application to specific cultural property cases and the collection and analysis of data specifically to address the connections between cultural property and transnational organized crime.