On Thursday, the European Commission will hold a presentation at the plenary session of the European Parliament on the topic “Treasures of Romania, illegally appropriated by Russia”, and then there will be a debate by MEPs and a vote for a resolution on this issue. , according to the agenda of the EP session in Strasbourg.

MEP Eugen Tomak (PPE) explained that this initiative is part of the context in which last year the European Union adopted its strategy for the return of heritage objects that are illegally in Europe.

“I participated in these debates (about strategy – no) as an MEP, a member of the subcommittee on human rights (DROI), and then I discovered that the situation with our treasure in Moscow is almost unknown at the European level. institutions Then I realized that it is very difficult to come and present a topic that is of maximum interest to us Romanians, but is completely unknown to the European public, European institutions,” said the president of PMP Agerpres last week.

Excerpts from the draft resolution submitted to the European Parliament:

• It reminds that the illegal appropriation of the national property of Romania by Russia is the only international case when the gold monetary reserve of a state and objects that are part of the national heritage of this state were transferred to another country for safekeeping on the basis of the consent provided in the relevant protocol documents, which provide for legal guarantees of restitution, but the obligations were ultimately not respected in violation of international norms and customs.”
• He recognizes that the national property deposited in Moscow in 1916 and 1917, during the difficult period of the First World War, with the guarantee of the Government of Imperial Russia for safety of transportation, safety of storage and safety of restitution in Romania, constitutes an unprecedented international case of misappropriation gold reserves and heritage sites and a problem that constantly worries Romanian society.
• expresses concern that despite the creation of a Romanian-Russian joint commission of experts authorized to allow discussions on this topic, efforts to return Romania’s national treasury – and thus ensure the return of the gold stock illegally confiscated from the National Bank of Romania – through bilateral diplomatic channels between Romania and Russia, they faced Russia’s reluctance to return what previous regimes held illegally, regardless of signed return protocols;
• He believes that Russia’s invasion of Ukraine should lead to a reassessment of EU-Russia relations in the future, which will include unprecedented dynamics and diplomatic requests, such as the return of the gold reserve allocated to the National Bank of Romania.
• emphasizes that the return of cultural values ​​and national heritage of an EU member state illegally held by a non-EU state requires significant diplomatic dialogue both bilaterally and in international forums.

In 1916-1917, Romania sent its treasury to Moscow

During the First World War, between 1916 and 1917, Romania sent the national treasure (which included significant amounts of gold, personal effects, art collections, jewels, archives) to Tsarist Russia for “protection” in case of occupation of the national territory.

After the communist regime came to power, Russia seized the treasure and refused to return it, and a large part of the valuables remains unreturned to this day.

Recently, the governor of the BNR said that the National Bank proposed to organize several measures to confirm, especially at the international level, that Romania has a very valid claim from a historical and legal point of view to its evacuated gold deposit in Moscow. in 1916-1917

Entering the war with the Entente in August 1916, Romania soon found itself in an extremely difficult situation due to fighting on two fronts in both Transylvania and the Danube. Therefore, already in September 1916, the National Bank of Romania took the first steps to hide its gold treasure.

h2 What the governor of the BNR said in the fall:

• This year, in December, it will be 107 years since the Romanian treasures were evacuated to Moscow. Since 1991, the National Bank of Romania has consistently implemented a strategy of presenting to the domestic and foreign public the Treasury issue sent to Moscow and then captured by the Soviet Union.
• Debt law in Romania is older than a century. We are not the first acts in this line. On the occasion of Russia’s accession to the Council of Europe in 1995, Romania, together with other former communist states, presented proposals for the restitution of goods confiscated by the Soviet Union. The Council’s Committee on Legal Affairs and Human Rights then decided that these issues should be resolved between the member states concerned.
• Russia did not accept this discussion even at the level of experts under the pretext that Moscow is discussing a draft law on the restitution of material goods that belonged to other states and were kept in the USSR during the war.
• Later, the draft law referred to by Russian experts was rejected by the State Duma of Russia. This development of events made it obvious the need to correctly inform international public opinion on the basis of indisputable documents.
• Thus, our main concern has been to make public the documents we have on this matter. I mean the original documents, I emphasize the originals collected in a special file that has been kept in the storage of the Viceroyalty of the BNR since 1922.
• The Treasury file has been passed from one governor to another since 1922, including the communist period. That’s how I got it too – as proof of the decision of the National Bank of Romania to return the assets belonging to it. The director of the Iasi department of the BNR was instructed to wait for the director Teodor Kepitanovych at the station, “Thursday, September 8, five o’clock in the afternoon”, to prepare the carriages and reserve five rooms in the hotel.