VANK opens ‘Korea-Africa Solidarity’ Platform for Return of Looted Cultural Heritage

The cyber diplomatic mission VANK (Director Park Ki-tae) announced on the 9th that it has opened a platform called 'Heritage Back' to call for the return of looted cultural heritage based on solidarity between Korea and the African continent, which have common ground in imperialist invasion.

Heritage Bag is a project that started from the awareness of the historical context in which imperialist powers in the late 19th and early 20th centuries used military force and colonial rule to destroy royal palaces, temples, and tombs in Asia and Africa and exported national heritage without permission.

VANK defined the history of exploitation of 1.4 billion people in Korea and Africa as 'parallel history' and placed the incident records of 16 pairs of cultural heritage (32 items in total) stolen through the same method side by side on one screen.

The purpose is to overcome the scars of colonialism and restore international justice by uniting the voices of affected countries, which were fragmented at the individual national level, into a huge global solidarity network.

The first exhibition hall highlights the 'Benin Bronze', a bronze relief of the royal family that was plundered by the British 'Punitive Expedition' during their invasion of Benin Kingdom of Nigeria in 1897, and the 'Royal Helmets and Armor of the Joseon Dynasty' collected throughout Korea by Takenosuke Ogura, president of Namseon Joint Electric Company during the Japanese colonial period, and housed in the Tokyo National Museum.

The ‘Plunder Cultural Heritage Profile’ on the site was constructed in the form of criminal investigation records. It contains an overview of the case, damage profile, timeline, key evidence, method profiling, legal issues, and testimony from the parties involved.

VANK divided the common methods of looters into 'stage 1' (robbing), which involves plundering royal palaces and temples by force or colonial power, 'stage 2' (disguising), which obscures the nature of the crime by renaming it as loot, personal collections, or auction items, and 'stage 3' (cleansing), which turns them into legitimate collections of famous Western museums through auctions and donations.

In addition, it pointed out the international legal limitations of the 1970 UNESCO Convention and the 1995 Unidroy Convention not being applied retroactively, and the alibis of offending countries that use their own laws as a shield, such as the British Museum Act (1963) in the UK, to prohibit the disposal of relics.

An 'Urgently Wanted' section has also been set up to bring those who led the looting to trial in a historic court.

Takenosuke Ogura, who took out about 1,100 pieces of national treasure-level cultural heritage from all over Korea, and Vice Admiral Harry Lawson of the Royal Navy, who led an expeditionary force in 1897 to burn down the Benin Royal Palace and loot relics, are on the list.

In addition, 16 leak routes connecting looted countries and overseas holding institutions were implemented in an interactive map. It provides a virtual repatriation experience function in which relics trapped in iron bars on the map are liberated to their home country by unlocking them.

When a global citizen leaves a pledge to take action, a letter of appointment as a 'Global Ambassador for the Recovery of Globally Looted Cultural Heritage' is issued with a unique number engraved on it. It supports four languages, including Korean, English, French, and Swahili, so that you can communicate without language barriers.

Director Park Ki-tae said, “When Korea and 1.4 billion Africans overcome the pain of parallel histories and speak out in solidarity, we can force museums in aggressing countries that hide behind their own laws prohibiting the disposal of collections to rewrite their bills.”

In the future, VANK plans to launch a movement to reclaim cultural heritage through social networking services (SNS) with young people around the world.

In collaboration with African civil society, we plan to continue a global campaign against major overseas collection institutions, such as the British Museum and the Tokyo National Museum, to correct distorted statements about illegally looted cultural heritage and to urge the return of cultural heritage.

The platform is available on the official website (https://heritageback.one).