On September 6 the Sicán Mask was recovered in Peru after a 19-year judicial process that began in 1999 when the Interpol Office in Wiesbaden, Germany seized it.
The Minister of Culture, Patricia Balbuena, received the archaeological piece from the Plenipotentiary of the Free State of Bavaria before the Federal State, Rolf-Dieter Jungk, who presented the respective export permit.
“Minister Balbuena explained to El Comercio that this case was reported when Interpol stopped an art dealer, of Turkish nationality. In 1999, the German legislation at that time stated that the Peruvian State should prove ownership of the property. The Sicán Mask was identified as part of the Pre-Columbian Art of Peru”, explained El Comercio.
When the archaeological piece was confiscated, a judicial process was initiated before the Regional Court of Munich, which on December 15, 2016, through the Sixth Civil Court, issued a ruling ordering the release of the Sicán Mask, confiscated by the Munich Prosecutor’s Office and authorizing its delivery to Peru.
It is believed that the Mask of Sicán would have been extracted from the Lambayeque region. “A lot of pieces were lost in the time of the famous ‘huaqueos’, which occurred in the north of the country,” said Balbuena to the media.
(Source)
(Cover Photo Twitter)
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