On The Legal Systems Of Egyptian Claiming Of Foreign Lost Antiquities

Egypt is one of the four countries with ancient civilization, has a long cultural history and numberless antiquities. Egyptian antiquities were often smuggled, stolen or pillaged by colonialist because of ignorance on antiquities'value of Egyptian government, flaw of legislation, unsteady Egypt power and so on. There have been lost abundance antiquities. The major antiquities export countries maintain that lost antiquities should return to their original countries and persist cultural nationalism, however, the major antiquities import countries insist cultural internationalism and advocate antiquities as human beings common interests and enjoyed by the whole word. Egypt is as one of the antiquities export countries. Egypt gradually forms own antiquities protection ideas during its claim of foreign lost antiquities. Antiquities firstly belong to Egypt, then belong to world. In order to effectively claim foreign lost antiquities, Egypt creates special antiquities institution and makes Egypt domestic culture protection systems. Domestic basis includes the antiquities'protection law no. 117 of the year 1983 and the amended law no. 3 of 2010. International basis includes the Convention for the Protection of Cultural Property in the Event of Armed Conflict, the Hague 1954; the Convention on the Means of Prohibiting and Preventing the Illicit Import, Export and Transfer of Ownership of Cultural Property and the UNIDROIT Convention on Stolen or Illegally Exported Cultural Objects. 1995 UNIDROIT Convention permits antiquities possessor, including individuals, strictly submit a request to the courts within the jurisdiction of convention parties, which indicate that this convention insists return of smuggled and stolen antiquities. Owing to empty of conventions, Egypt encountered many complex issues through foreign actions, so Egypt often requests return antiquities through non-lawsuit method. This thesis set the case of United States v. Frederick Schultz an example, using case study approach, analyzed legal problems encountered by Egypt through foreign actions. It indicated that Egypt is the true owner of cultures; in the world"stolen"takes the liberal interpretation to protect domestic cultural heritage; the special Egyptian institution played an important role during antiquities return. Using comprehensive analyzing methods, this thesis illustrated lessons for China through Egyptian legal systems of claiming foreign lost antiquities. Firstly, we should insist cultural nationalism ideas; secondly, we should study and improve our legal systems of claiming foreign lost antiquities; thirdly, we should take advantages of international conventions in order to reach a common perspective.