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Some 1,500 artworks return to Russia from exhibitions abroad — Culture Ministry

Earlier, Mikhail Shvydkoy, the president’s special representative for international cultural cooperation, informed the problem of recovering Russian artwork had been largely resolved

MOSCOW, June 24. /TASS/. Around 1,500 works of art, which had been on show in museums and galleries abroad, returned home, Russia’s Culture Ministry said on Friday.

"Some 1,500 items that had been on loan in museums in Belarus, Belgium, Britain, Hungary, Germany, Italy, Spain, Korea, the UAE, the Netherlands, Oman, Serbia, France, the Czech Republic, and Japan returned to Russia," the ministry’s press service said.

The Culture Ministry, the government, the Foreign Ministry, customs bodies, the Federal Agency for Air Transport, insurance companies and museums have all joined efforts to get exhibits from Russian museums’ collections returned home, the press service said.

Mikhail Shvydkoy, the president’s special representative for international cultural cooperation, earlier said the problem of recovering Russian artwork had been largely resolved.

In early April, Finland returned the museum exhibits it had seized en route from Italy and Japan, as the European Commission said Russian works of art that had been on loan abroad were not subject to EU sanctions. Other countries too began returning Russian artwork, including masterpieces from the Morozov collection, which were on show in Paris.

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