"An investigation disclosed that, until the Second World War, the cross had been part of an art collection belonging to Izabella Elzbieta of Czartoryski Dzialinska, Poland. Before the outbreak of war, Elzbieta tried to hide the piece from the Nazis by concealing it in the cellar of a building in Warsaw. But the Nazis found it in 1941 and later brought it, along with other items from Elzbieta's collection, to a castle in Austria. It is unclear what happened next."[/p]
[font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="3"]The Commission for Looted Art in Europe (CLAE) is the expert representative body in Europe dealing with all matters relating to Nazi looted art and other cultural property.[/font][font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2"] It helps families, communities and institutions worldwide with research, identification and recovery of looted cultural property.[/font]CLAE is an independent, non profit-making body which is mandated to represent the European Council of Jewish Communities (ECJC) and the Conference of European Rabbis (CER)[/p][div align="left"][font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif"]Released in connection with the Washington Conference on Holocaust-Era Assets, Washington, DC, December 3, 1998
In developing a consensus on non-binding principles to assist in resolving issues relating to Nazi-confiscated art, the Conference recognizes that among participating nations there are differing legal systems and that countries act within the context of their own laws. [/font] [/div] [font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2"]
1. Art that had been confiscated by the Nazis and not subsequently restituted should be identified. [/font][font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2"]2. Relevant records and archives should be open and accessible to researchers, in accordance with the guidelines of the International Council on Archives.[/font][font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2"]
[/font][font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2"]3. Resources and personnel should be made available to facilitate the identification of all art that had been confiscated by the Nazis and not subsequently restituted. [/font][font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2"]
[/font][/p][font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2"]4. In establishing that a work of art had been confiscated by the Nazis and not subsequently restituted, consideration should be given to unavoidable gaps or ambiguities in the provenance in light of the passage of time and the circumstances of the Holocaust era. [/font][font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2"]
[/font][/p][font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2"]5. Every effort should be made to publicize art that is found to have been confiscated by the Nazis and not subsequently restituted in order to locate its pre-War owners or their heirs. [/font][font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2"]
[/font][/p][font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2"]6. Efforts should be made to establish a central registry of such information. [/font][font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2"]
[/font][/p][font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2"]7. Pre-War owners and their heirs should be encouraged to come forward and make known their claims to art that was confiscated by the Nazis and not subsequently restituted.[/font]
[/p][font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2"][/font][font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2"]8. If the pre-War owners of art that is found to have been confiscated by the Nazis and not subsequently restituted, or their heirs, can be identified, steps should be taken expeditiously to achieve a just and fair solution, recognizing this may vary according to the facts and circumstances surrounding a specific case.[/font]
[/p][font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2"][/font][font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2"]9. If the pre-War owners of art that is found to have been confiscated by the Nazis, or their heirs, can not be identified, steps should be taken expeditiously to achieve a just and fair solution.[/font]
[/p][font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2"][/font][font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2"]10. Commissions or other bodies established to identify art that was confiscated by the Nazis and to assist in addressing ownership issues should have a balanced membership.[/font]
[/p]11. Nations are encouraged to develop national processes to implement these principles, particularly as they relate to alternative dispute resolution mechanisms for resolving ownership issues.
[/p][a href="vny!://www.lootedartcommission.com/lootedart_washingtonprinciples.htm"]vny!://www.lootedartcommission.com/lootedart_washingtonprinciples.htm[/a][font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2"]So, if anyone is getting paid apparently for this its the people of the art collection that was stolen from the Nazi's. (if anyone from the family survived the war). I doubt they'll get it back though. Probably they'll just go down as the last owners and get paid a sum.
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