Over recent years, art smuggling has skyrocketed in Russia -- from 375 cases in 1989 to 4,976 last year, according to ministry spokesman Colonel Vladimir Vorontsev. In spite of the spiraling statistics, the ministry claims fresh success, saying the number of arrests has risen just as dramatically.
Vorontsev reeled off stories of the ministry's coups. In one three-day crackdown that ended Monday, 1,050 stolen icons were seized by Russian police. Earlier this year, 30 paintings by Dutch masters stolen from a private collector in 1990 were uncovered in a Moscow apartment.
The ministry's press conference was held in a room stocked with icons, military relics and one antique ceramic vase that on the black market, Vorontsev said, would bring "the price of a Mercedes." A cache of icons was found in a Volvo parked on Kutuzovsky Prospekt.
"We all live in one house, and that house is great Russia," said Anatoly Davydov, assistant manager of the Interior Ministry's Criminal Justice Department. "From a spiritual point of view, it is crucial that we protect it."
To make his point, Davydov delivered a recovered 17th-century icon into the hands of Father Vladislav Klanovets, prior of a Kronshtadt church that decades ago lost hope of finding the treasured relic.
Art contraband has become a crime of choice, particularly among young intellectuals who have an eye for what they're stealing, Interior Ministry studies show.
Most of the art smugglers apprehended in the last year have been scientists, although 21 percent have been artists themselves and 17 percent were engineers. One reason for the rise in crime is increasing art values within Russia, Vorontsev said.
To combat this trend, the Interior Ministry has joined forces with the State Customs Commission and the Culture Ministry to step up security and prosecution of art crimes. The broad-ranging campaign involves the installation of foreign-manufactured security systems at the country's preeminent museums, as well as an exhaustive catalogue of property in the 1,536 museums that the Culture Ministry oversees, said Tamara Polyakova, the Culture Ministry's expert on museum affairs.
In the first stage of the operation, the ministry has already recovered 24 stolen pictures, 1,330 icons, 488 medals and 68 antique weapons, according to their statistics. And customs has seized 16 paintings, 300 icons and 248 precious metal items on their way out of the country.
In St. Petersburg, customs officials prevented the smuggling of five Malevich paintings. In Sochi in May, customs seized 155 icons on their way to Israel.
Viktor Kalinin, legal counsel for the Moscow Patriarchate, said the returned Kronshtadt icon was much appreciated, but that the church was waiting for a good deal more.
"I very much hope that this process will continue," he said.
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