Report on National Controls over the Export of Cultural Material

In June, 2009, the ILA Committee on Cultural Heritage Law, meeting in Geneva, Switzerland, discussed preliminary reports from its members on their countries' various systems for controlling exports of cultural material. At that meeting the Committee decided also to study other aspects of export controls, including provisions in key international agreements as well as the European Union regime concerning the export of cultural material from the territories of its members to destinations both within and outside the EU. Since the 2009 meeting, Committee members have submitted eighteen reports on the export controls of their individual countries and an additional seven reports on broader aspects of the topic. This report is a synthesis of all of those reports. It is necessarily selective and incomplete but is intended to serve as a basis for discussions at the committee's meeting during the 2010 ILA Conference. The Committee will also discuss the possibility of publishing a book that would include the reports and other material.