US Customs has announced broad new import restrictions on archaeological and ethnological objects for Uzbekistan’s authoritarian government that apply to cultural goods dating as recently as 1917.
More here:
These import restrictions derive from a Cultural Property Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) signed by the Biden Administration along with a spate of others with authoritarian governments as “soft power measures.”
Since President Trump’s regulatory freeze was lifted, renewals of prior restrictions on behalf of El Salvador and Ecuador have been announced, but this is the first new set of restrictions issued under the Trump II Administration.
Such import controls on cultural goods are particularly controversial because they are enforced as embargoes on cultural goods coming from legitimate markets abroad, most significantly those in Europe.
Even worse, US Customs gives collectors no meaningful due process before their private property is detained, seized and forfeited. The Cultural Property Implementation Act only gives the government the right to repatriate coins and other artifacts "first discovered within" and hence "subject to the export control" of a particular country that also is "exported.. from the State Party after the designation of such material...." 19 USC Sections 2601, 2606. But as far as the government is concerned, all it instead need show is that an item is of a type on one of the ever increasing numbers of designated lists before it can be repatriated.
These problems are compounded, because designated lists, like that for Uzbekistan, have over time become grossly overbroad, covering coins and other items found in multiple countries. The designated list for coins here is as follows.
5. Coins—Ancient coins
commonly found in Uzbekistan include gold, silver, copper, and copper alloy
coins in a variety of denominations. Includes gold and silver ingots, which may
be plain and/or inscribed. Some of the most well-known types are described below:
a. Achaemenid period coins,
including Darics, Sigloi, Late Achaemenid Anatolian currencies. Approximate
date: 550-330 B.C.E.
b. Greco-Bactrian coins,
include gold staters, silver tetradrachms, silver and bronze drachms, and a
small number of punch-marked coins. The bust of the king, the king on
horseback, or an animal were on the obverse, and images of Greek deities or
various symbols were on the reverse with the king's name written in Greek.
Local rulers also minted imitations of these types. Approximate date: 250-125
B.C.E.
c. Kushan Dynasty coins
include silver tetradrachms, copper coins, bronze didrachms, and gold dinars.
Imagery includes portrait busts (Augustus type) or standing figures of the king
with his emblem (tamgha). Classical Greek and Zoroastrian deities and images of
the Buddha are depicted on the reverse. Approximate date: 19-230 C.E.
d. Kushano-Sasanian or
Kushanshah coins include gold dinars, silver tetradrachms, and copper alloy
denominations. Some Kushano-Sasanian coins followed the Kushan style of
imagery, while others resemble Sasanian coins with the bust of the king wearing
a large crown and Zoroastrian fire altars and deities. Inscriptions are written
in Bactrian, Brahmi, or Pahlavi scripts. Approximate date: 225-365 C.E.
e. Hunnic (Hephthalite and
Kidarite) coins include silver drachms, silver dinars, and small copper and
bronze coins. Hephthalite coins resemble Sasanian coins with a portrait bust of
the king on the obverse and a Zoroastrian fire altar on the reverse. Approximate
date: late 4th to mid-8th centuries C.E.
f. Sogdian coins include
bronze and silver dirhams and drachms. Some Sogdian coins are cast with a
central hole, similar to coins from the Tang Dynasty in China. Sogdian coins
may include imagery of Zoroastrian fire altars, rulers, portrait busts in profile,
horse and rider, camels, and lions. Coins may have inscriptions in Sogdian
scripts. Approximate dates: 4th to 9th centuries C.E.
g. Samanid, Karakhanid,
Khorezmshah dynasty coins include bronze, copper, silver, and gold dinars and
jitals and silver dirhams. Coins of these dynasties usually display Arabic
inscriptions on both faces. Some Karakhanid coins have punch marks, like coins
from the Tang Dynasty. Some Khorezmshah coins may have imagery of an elephant
or horse with rider. Approximate date: 800-1250 C.E.
h. Chaghatai and Timurid
coins include silver and copper tangas and dinars. Both coin types are
decorated with Arabic inscriptions. Approximate date: 1227-1507 C.E.
i. Khanates of Bukhara,
Khiva, and Kokand coins include copper, silver, and gold tangas; gold dinars;
silver tetradrachms; gold ashfris and tillos or tillas. Coin types are
decorated with inscriptions. Coins may be associated with the Janid, Shaybanid,
or other dynasties. Approximate date: 1500-1773 C.E.
As indicated in the International Association of Professional Numismatist's comments to the Cultural Property Advisory Committee (CPAC), most such coins "commonly found" in Uzbekistan also circulated in considerable numbers elsewhere, meaning that one cannot simply assume as Customs does here that such coins were "first discovered within, and [are] subject to export control by" Uzbekistan. 19 USC Section 2601.
For additional information
about the Uzbek request and the CPAC meeting that reviewed it, see https://culturalpropertynews.org/us-state-dept-uzbekistan-art-embargo-50000-bc-to-1917/
and https://culturalpropertynews.org/cpac-report-coin-collectors-face-more-collateral-damage/
Unfortunately, the one court challenge on such restrictions went nowhere, with the Hon. J. Harvie Wilkinson of the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals telling coin collectors they were entitled to less due process than he later thought should be afforded to an illegal alien deported as an alleged MS 13 gang member.
Given the continuation of ever broader overlapping embargos imposed on behalf of authoritarian governments and the apparent unwillingness of the courts to protect the private property rights of collectors, legislative reform is sorely needed.
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