[MSN] BANGLADESH DECIDES NOT TO LEND NATIONAL ART TREASURES TO MUSÉE GUIMET,PARIS. (The Bangladesh authorities and the Bangladesh museums should stop accusing the Guimet Museum and the French authorities but rather investigate their own role in this matter)

[Museum Security Network Mailing list]

Something is bothering me here. Why didn't the Bangladesh government nor the
Bangladesh museums stop the transport of the objects to France? Why did they
make a loan agreement in the first place? An agreement that with hindsight
they do not agree upon. It appears that the Guimet Museum gets all the blame
for a theft that took place in Bangladesh. I do not understand the ratio in
this.
Loans take place based on loan agreements. In those agreements not only all
individual objects are (should be) described, but these agreements also
specify (or should specify) insurance figures. It is astonishing that after
the loan agreement was made it appears that not all objects were registered
and that the insurance for the objects was too low. 
With all due respect, I am convinced that the Bangladesh authorities and the
Bangladesh museums should stop accusing the Guimet Museum and the French
authorities but rather investigate their own role in this matter.

Ton Cremers


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-----Original Message-----
From: Ton Cremers [mailto:museum-security at museum-security.org] 
Sent: zondag 6 januari 2008 9:13
To: 'list at museum-security.org'
Subject: BANGLADESH DECIDES NOT TO LEND NATIONAL ART TREASURES TO MUSÉE
GUIMET,PARIS. COULD AN AFRICAN COUNTRY DARE TO DO THE SAME? (Would the
Government be bold enough to say enough is enough and terminate its
collaboration with the European museum?)

Sunday, 06 January 2008
BANGLADESH DECIDES NOT TO LEND NATIONAL ART TREASURES TO MUSÉE GUIMET,PARIS.
COULD AN AFRICAN COUNTRY DARE TO DO THE SAME?

The Government of Bangladesh decided on 25 December to cancel its
collaboration with the Parisian Musée Guimet after the theft of two statutes
of Vishnu, 1500 years old in the International Freight Zone at the Dhaka Zia
International Airport. The remaining 143 pieces will be returned to the
Bangladeshi museums and the French authorities have been requested to return
the other 42 pieces which were already sent to France on 1 December. Musée
Guimet has cancelled the exhibition, Masterpieces from the Ganges Delta,
Collections of Bangladesh Museums (Chefs-d’oeuvre du delta du Gange) which
was to open on 9 January, after having been already once postponed from
October 2007.