Yemen protects cultural heritage by adhering to Unesco and Unidroit conventions

From now on, the art market will have to pay more attention to the provenance of Yemeni assets as the country has equipped itself with international instruments to protect and, above all, demand cultural goods removed from the territory. To get an idea of the assets at risk, one can consult the red list drawn up by Icom for Yemen.

Yemen's political environment remains highly unstable. Since 2014, the country has been ravaged by a civil war pitting the internationally recognised government against Iranian-backed Houthi forces. Further complicating the picture, the intervention of the Saudi-led coalition has aggravated the humanitarian crisis and fuelled regional tensions. The fragile ceasefire reached in 2022, supported by the UN, has provided minimal relief for the population, but the conflict is not resolved. The central government has limited control over the territory, leaving vast areas vulnerable to corruption and looting of cultural property, a phenomenon made even more critical by the economic situation.

Thousand-year-old archaeological sites, ancient cities and pre-Islamic artefacts are easy targets for looters and unscrupulous art dealers. Local cultural institutions are often without resources, unable to protect heritage from criminal gangs feeding the international black market. The conflict has, in fact, facilitated smuggling, as artefacts are stolen and sold to finance armed groups. Reports by archaeologists and international organisations indicate an escalation of the phenomenon, with Yemeni artefacts increasingly appearing in auctions and private collections abroad.

On 7 October, Yemen acceded to the 1995 Unidroit Convention on Stolen or Illicitly Exported Cultural Property, after having joined the Unesco Convention on the Protection of the Underwater Cultural Heritage in June. As of 2019, it was already a party to the 1970 Unesco Convention on the Means of Prohibiting and Preventing the Illicit Import, Export and Transfer of Ownership of Cultural Property, while in 2023 it had ratified the Second Protocol to the 1954 Hague Convention. This step forward was strongly supported by the Yemeni Ambassador to Unesco, Dr. Mohammed Jumeh, representing the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, who led the effort to bring the country in line with international standards of heritage protection. Accession to the treaties implies a greater commitment to heritage protection and the return of stolen or illicitly exported goods and strengthens international cooperation to combat illicit trafficking.

In 2023, after 20 years of safekeeping, 77 archaeological artefacts were returned by the US to Yemen, but only on paper. In fact, these treasures will be displayed at the Smithsonian Institution's National Museum of Asian Art, following a partnership between the institution and the Yemeni government, signed by Ambassador Mohammed Al-Hadhrami in Washington for two years subject to possible extension. A similar agreement was reached in 2023 with the Victoria & Albert Museum in London for four Yemeni antiquities dating back to 1000 BC. Since 2023, the Metropolitan Museum in New York has also been holding archaeological goods from Yemen returned to the country from New Zealand. The Met's website mentions other such agreements with countries such as India, Greece, Thailand, Nigeria, Korea and Italy. Such partnerships have attracted criticism as they could be perceived as neo-colonialist legacies, especially in cases like the Greek Stern collection, where the terms would mainly favour Western cultural institutions.