The issue of Russia seizing Romania’s national treasury is discussed by the European Parliament
On Thursday, the European Commission will back a declaration made in front of the European Parliament on the return of the Romanian treasury that Russia had wrongfully taken during World War I. The European Parliament plenary session that was called to Strasbourg has scheduled a debate on the Commission’s statement, followed by a vote on a related resolution.
The project is part of the framework within which the European Union developed a policy last year for recovering heritage that has been trafficked illegally in Europe, according to MEP Eugen Tomac (PPE), who made this statement to AGERPRES last week.
The European Parliament debates the situation of Romania’s national treasury seized by Russia. The European Commission will support a declaration before the Members of the European Parliament on the restitution of the Romanian treasury, illegally appropriated by Russia during the First World War, on Thursday. The Commission’s statement will be followed by a debate, after which a related resolution will be put to the vote, according to the agenda of the European Parliament plenary session, convened in Strasbourg.
MEP Eugen Tomac (PPE) stated last week to AGERPRES that the initiative is part of the context in which the European Union adopted last year a strategy for recovering illicitly trafficked heritage in Europe.
„I participated in this debate (on the strategy – ed.) as a Member of the European Parliament of the Subcommittee on Human Rights (DROI), and on that occasion, I realized that the situation of our treasury in Moscow is almost completely unknown at the level of European institutions. Then I realized that it is very difficult to present a subject that is of maximum interest to us, Romanians, but is completely unknown to the European public, to European institutions,” said the president of the PMP.
„In this context, I decided to propose a series of actions to make known the issue of the National Bank of Romania’s treasury and our entire treasury in Moscow. At the moment, we have managed to present to all Members of the European Parliament two complete volumes in English, published by the National Bank of Romania, and, moreover, to initiate a resolution (…) to create the necessary mechanisms for the dossier of Romania’s treasury, located in Moscow, to become a matter of European interest,” he explained.
PSD MEP Victor Negrescu stated that the discussion in the European Parliament plenary about Romania’s illegally appropriated treasury by Russia is significant because it raises awareness of a topic about which European partners were unaware on Wednesday during a meeting with Romanian journalists in the European Parliament in Strasbourg.
In case of a takeover of its territory, Romania moved its national treasury, which contained substantial quantities of gold, artifacts, jewelry, documents, and art collections, to Tsarist Russia between 1916 and 1917 during World War I. According to the European Parliament’s presentation of this item on the plenary session’s agenda on its website, Russia seized the Treasury after the communist system was installed and refused to return it, leaving many values intact to this day.
