HERITRACE - Strengthening the fight against trafficking in cultural property

Illicit trafficking in cultural property fuels organised criminal networks and helps finance illicit activities. It also leads to an irreversible loss of memory, identity, and cultural diversity. To address this problem, HERITRACE adopts an integrated approach that brings together cultural heritage institutions, judicial authorities, security forces, customs administrations, and art market actors to develop coordinated and sustainable responses. 

HERITRACE covers the key issues of security, governance, and cultural heritage preservation. It is run jointly by Expertise France and the Arma dei Carabinieri, with the support of the European Union. The project supports the fight against trafficking in cultural property and builds the capacities of partner countries in the Middle East and North Africa region to prevent, detect, and prosecute these crimes. It also contributes to the overall fight against organised crime, money laundering, and the financing of terrorism.

The project, with an implementation period of 36 months, targets six partner countries of the region: Algeria, Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Morocco, and Tunisia. They are particularly vulnerable to looting, illicit excavations, and trafficking in cultural property, and they are the countries of origin of illegally exported cultural property as well as countries of transit. They face common challenges in cultural property protection, institutional capacity-building, and regional cooperation.

The project makes cultural heritage protection a priority action, to address the looting that threatens heritage sites and collections. Its actions include building the capacities of cultural heritage authorities and art market professionals in order to identify cultural property at risk and to promote the use of documentation tools and digital databases to facilitate their traceability. It also works to establish or bolster specialised units dedicated to fighting the trafficking of cultural property.

HERITRACE will develop training tailored to the needs of investigative services, magistrates, prosecutors, and customs administrations in order to improve trafficking detection, investigative techniques, evidence collection, procedures for the seizure and restitution of cultural property, as well as legal proceedings. These actions will also help strengthen national legal frameworks and operational capacities.

The project will promote exchanges between North African and Middle Eastern partner countries and the European Union, with the goals of improving information sharing, disseminating good practices, and harmonising operational procedures. The creation of cooperation networks, national focal points, and common coordination mechanisms will help strengthen the collective response to a phenomenon that is transnational by nature.

Through these various actions, HERITRACE seeks to mainstream cultural heritage protection into public policies on security and regional cooperation. By promoting skills development, institution building, and cooperation between relevant stakeholders, the project will contribute to preserving cultural heritage, fighting organised crime, and strengthening stability both in the North Africa and Middle East region and between the two shores of the Mediterranean.