*EPF407 09/25/2003
Investigators Assess, Retrieve Stolen Iraqi Artifacts
(Combination of amnesty, raids, and detective work have recovered 3,400 items) (1130)

By Phyllis McIntosh
Washington File Special Correspondent

Washington -- Through international detective work and delicate negotiations within Iraq, U.S. authorities have recovered more than 3,400 artifacts that were stolen or looted from the Iraqi museum in Baghdad following the coalition military actions in April.

At a recent Pentagon briefing, Marine Colonel Matthew Bogdanos, leader of the U.S. government's investigation of the thefts, reported that half of the items were returned voluntarily as part of a "no questions asked" amnesty policy. The rest have been retrieved through targeted raids within Iraq and seizures in Jordan, Italy, the United Kingdom, and the United States.

The number of items known to be missing from the museum now stands at slightly more than 10,000, although "this number will change on a daily basis," Bogdanos said. "It is abundantly clear," he added, that the original estimate of 170,000 stolen artifacts was "simply wrong."

Bogdanos is a former homicide prosecutor for the New York City District Attorney's Office and holds a graduate degree in classical studies from Columbia University. Called to active duty following the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, he heads a 13-member team of military and customs enforcement personnel charged with recovering the stolen artifacts.

After investigating, the team concluded that the thefts fall into three categories, suggesting that there were several different types of perpetrators involved. In the public galleries, highly selective thieves stole 40 of the museum's most valuable items. Ten of these have been recovered, including the Sacred Vase of Warka, a 3,000-year-old limestone votive vase that may be the most significant piece owned by the museum.

In the second category are more than 3,100 pieces stolen from two storage rooms. Here, looters simply emptied shelves at random, apparently unable to distinguish priceless objects from fakes. Some 99 percent of items returned by neighborhood residents under the amnesty program came from these rooms.

The third major theft occurred in an out-of-the-way basement storage room and almost certainly had to be an inside job, Bogdanos said. Taken were the world's finest collection of Greek, Roman, Islamic, and Arabic gold and silver coins and one of the finest collections of cylinder seals - small stone cylinders used to stamp designs or signatures onto pottery. Recovery of these items may prove most difficult, Bogdanos noted, because they are not easily recognizable as contraband and all 10,000 stolen pieces could fit into a single large backpack.

The primary purpose of the investigation has been recovery of stolen antiquities, not necessarily criminal prosecution of the thieves, Bogdanos emphasized. To that end, his team had four goals: to determine precisely what was missing; to disseminate photographs of missing items to international law enforcement authorities and art experts; to work with community and religious leaders in Iraq to publicize an amnesty policy for the return of items; and develop leads and conduct raids on targeted locations in Iraq.

It has been extremely difficult to determine precisely what is missing, Bogdanos said, because of the sheer size of the museum's collection and its incomplete inventory system prior to the war. Also, there were many items from excavation sites throughout the country that had not yet been catalogued. The inventory of missing items is being updated on a daily basis with the help of American, British, and Italian archaeologists and museum specialists. Bogdanos stressed that numbers alone cannot tell the whole story, however. "It is simply impossible to quantify the loss of the world's first known Sumerian mask of a female deity," he said. "It is irreplaceable."

Dissemination of photographs also proved difficult, Bogdanos noted, because there were no photos of many items, and those that did exist were of poor quality or were destroyed during the looting. In order to make the stolen items as recognizable as possible throughout the world, the investigative team has distributed photographs of items as nearly identical as possible to those that are missing. These photos led to seizures at checkpoints, airports, and international border crossings outside of Iraq that have yielded more than 750 lost artifacts.

Within Iraq, random car stops and raids based on credible leads resulted in the recovery of more than 900 items. Almost half of those were returned by Ahmed Chalabi, the interim Iraqi president, after Iraqi National Congress forces stopped a car at a checkpoint near Kut in southern Iraq.

The heart of the team's effort has been the enormously successful amnesty program, which required some careful diplomacy and winning of trust, usually conducted over tea. Artifacts were not returned by someone simply walking up to the gate and handing over a bag, Bogdanos said. Instead, the scenario usually involved someone coming in and saying "If I have a friend who knows a friend who might have a piece, what would happen?" "Well, why don't we meet the friend?" the investigators would respond. "Let's have some tea. Let's talk about it." Three or four meetings later, the item would be returned.

The amnesty program proved useful far beyond Iraq. On a recent trip home to New York, Bogdanos was contacted by someone who said he had something to turn over. "A meeting was arranged, a package was turned over, and a 4,000-year-old Akhadian tablet is now in the hands of the Iraqi museum, where it belongs."

Weeks before the war, the museum staff had moved more than 8,300 of the more valuable artifacts and some 39,000 manuscripts to secret locations, swearing on the Koran not to reveal their locations. "After weeks of trust-building and more tea than I can count," Bogdanos said, investigators were granted access to the hiding places, saw the items, verified that they were complete, and agreed to leave them there. They will be removed, he said, when the Iraqis are able to provide sufficient security for the museum.

What was important for the museum staff, as well as people granted amnesty, Bogdanos said, "was a sense of pride, the sense of culture, the assurance that these items would be kept safe and not returned to the Ba'ath Party or the former regime."

To further help law enforcement authorities and people in the art world recognize stolen items, the team has produced a poster depicting 30 of the most significant missing artifacts. The goal is simple, Bogdanos said. "I want a Chilean border official, a Lithuanian customs official, or an Okinawan police officer to see an item, recognize it as a cylinder seal, say very simply, ����You shouldn't have that. It's stolen from the Iraq museum in Baghdad, and you are under arrest.'"

(The Washington File is a product of the Bureau of International Information Programs, U.S. Department of State. Web site: http://usinfo.state.gov)

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