Venezuela Demands
Germany to Return Sacred Stone
CARACAS - Venezuelan cultural authorities
asked Germany to speed up the procedures to
return the Kueka Abuela Stone, a sacred rock
for the Pemon ethnical group, which is the
possession of the Tiergarten Municipal Park
in Berlin.
The demand was made in a ruling by the
Cultural Heritage Institute to the
Venezuelan Foreign Ministry, which was
published in the Official Gazette.
The jasper stone is considered a Venezuelan
Asset of Cultural Interest and was extracted
illegally from the Canaima National Park in
1998 by virtue of an alleged donation made
by the then president of the National Parks
Institute, Hector Hernandez.
According to documents, Hernandez authorized
Austrian-German citizen Wolfgang Kraker von
Shwarzenfeld to take the stone to Germany.
The Bolivarian News Agency (ABN) reported
that the German Foreign Ministry expressed
its willingness to return the stone if
Venezuela pays for transportation costs and
possible actions by a third party.
However, the Convention of the United
Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural
Organization (UNESCO) establishes that the
expenses to return illegally-transferred
cultural assets must be paid by the state
that holds the piece.
Both Venezuela and Germany approved and
ratified the Convention.
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