Word: illicitness
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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Some governments have attempted to regulate or prevent the sale of antiquities. So has the International Commission of Museums, which publishes a Red List of African archaeological objects particularly at risk of looting. None have had much success. Interpol, the international police organization, estimates that the illicit trade in cultural property is worth $4.5 billion a year worldwide, up from $1 billion a decade ago. Africa accounts for 10% of this black market, and its share is growing. "It's a fantastically big problem," says Omotoso Eluyemi, director general at Nigeria's National Commission for Museums and Monuments (N.C.M.M...
Tourists scoop up some of the illicit bargains, but the best artifacts are bought by dealers filling orders from Europe, the U.S. and South Africa. Using a letter from the N.C.M.M. permitting him to export contemporary arts and crafts--but not antiquities--Lagos dealer Chinedu Idezuna recently booked a crateful of works onto a flight to Amsterdam. "Customs officials check the shipment for narcotics, for this and that, but because I've got the letter, I'm fine," he says. "Our government doesn't permit it, of course, but we gallery owners get [objects] out by telling [customs officials] that...
...sell it, loan it out, or use it as kindling. But you can't make multiple copies for distribution. And as digital publishing becomes more common, the duplication of content keeps getting easier and more practical. Instead of standing at the photocopier for hours to make an illicit copy of a John Grisham novel, you can in theory now just copy a file and email it to thousands of your close personal friends - and Mr. Grisham and his publisher wouldn't see a dime...
...author's storytelling ability?enriched by 10 years of research?propels the narrative from one blood-splattered incident to the next. As a young boy in the 1950s, Veerappan quickly learned he could earn respect by carrying a gun?and using it. He started his illicit career by killing elephants, bribing forestry and police officials to get past checkpoints protecting the dwindling herds in forest reserves, and selling the ivory for lucrative sums to traders. Utilizing the same techniques and connections, he recruited villagers to illegally fell sandalwood trees, which he then smuggled to northern Indian factories that produce...
...company threatened to implicate the current government as former Foreign Minister Roland Dumas provided Le Figaro newspaper with fresh allegations. Dumas, sentenced last month to six months in jail on corruption charges, said Employment Minister Elisabeth Guigou and Foreign Minister Hubert Védrine knew about illicit payments to secure the purchase of a German oil refinery for Elf. Guigou and Védrine, former presidential advisers to François Mitterrand, denied the allegations...