Sheremetyevo International Airport, Terminal D, Sheremetyevo customs officers during the search operations have stopped trying to import into the territory of the Russian Federation of cultural values.
Arrived on a flight from New York's passenger, a Russian citizen, was returning to Moscow from the famous auction CHRISTIE'S. In pursuit of a "green corridor" was halted customs inspector. As a result of the examination in one of the bags the women were found four book illustrations (sketches of male and female costumes), packed in a cardboard box.
According to the results of expert examination revealed that these items are authentic classical theater works by Alexander Benois, among them - sketches of theatrical costumes "Skorokhod," A man in uniform, "" Dancing Queen "and" GENTLEWOMAN. These works date from the beginning of XX century and represent a sample of high-level Russian theatrical dekaratsionnogo art. Sketches and works by Alexander Benois, subject to the law of the Russian Federation dated 15.04.1993 "On export and import of cultural values."
Based on current legislation, items that are defined as cultural property, subject to written declaration with the mandatory registration.
At present, this fact Sheremetyevo customs investigation department of review under Part 2 of Art. 188 of the Criminal Code. http://www.customs.ru/ru/press/of_ne...hp?id286=37806
Eh, no luck girl. Not only is confiscated as contraband, so more and go to trial. But only because of the fact that she did not know about the declaration of the art imported into Russia. It is in Europe and the U.S. nobody cares what you bring in a piece of art, but in Russia everything should be declare.
I myself had a similar situation when I first caught at customs for import of antiquities. True, the customs officers found all that stuff, just sent me to declare to the duty representative Min. Culture there at the airport. As it turned out: "and could in fact and a razor blade across his throat slash" (C).