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February 21, 2025

Greetings From Amsterdam,

In this edition of OCCRP Weekly, we’re shedding new light on a collection of valuable antiquities whose dubious origins went undetected by top museums and collectors for years. We’ll also take a close look at the impact of sanctions, as well as issues of transparency in Georgian election monitoring.

Here’s the latest in global crime and corruption:


** An OCCRP Feature
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** The Ancient Egyptian Treasures of a German Sailor Who May Not Have Existed
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For years, the name of Johannes Behrens, a German naval officer said to have sailed the Mediterranean just after the turn of the 19th century, graced the descriptions of artifacts in some of the world’s top museums.

The “Behrens collection” included spectacular antiquities the sailor ostensibly bought during his years of adventures: A carved stone dating to the reign of King Tut; an ancient table leg with the head of a goat carved into it; a Roman bowl with a detailed relief depicting a scene of the sun god Helios; and other pieces sold at the major auction house Christie’s and featured in top museums — from the Louvre Abu Dhabi to New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Museum of Fine Arts Boston.

But new evidence indicates the German sailor might never have acquired these treasures. Some question whether he even existed at all.

A prominent Egyptologist’s interest was aroused by an image of a carved stone, known as a stele, on display at the Louvre Abu Dhabi in 2017. French and U.S. investigators looked into this and other objects, which they now allege were smuggled by a ring of traffickers. An elderly art dealer, Serop Simonian, was arrested in Hamburg in late 2023 over charges of coordinating their sales. He’s among a handful of people caught up in the probe — all of whom have denied the allegations. Even the Louvre’s former president was charged with art trafficking. The investigation is ongoing.

Now, OCCRP’s regional partner, Arab Reporters for Investigative Journalism, has identified further objects that have been attributed to the Behrens collection ([link removed]) , but have not been flagged by experts, by scouring auction house data and publicly available information. One of those was sold for $230,000. None had been flagged by U.S. or French investigators, since the auction houses lie outside their jurisdiction.

According to Simonian, his family acquired the collection legally from an antiquities dealer referenced in books and documents from the mid-20th century. But investigators have not found evidence that the dealer’s active years align with the timeline of Simonian’s story.

Antiquities are often obtained illegally — whether from archaeological sites, graves, temples or elsewhere, said Tess Davis, executive director of campaign group The Antiquities Coalition. That means criminals often “launder” antiquities by falsifying their origin.

“It’s much easier to forge a provenance than it is to forge an antiquity,” she said.


** Read the full story ([link removed])
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** Our Latest Scoops
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** Belgium Blocked $270B Due To Russian Sanctions. Much of It Belongs to Unsanctioned Investors.
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When sanctions were imposed on Russia in 2022 because of its full-scale invasion of Ukraine, it wasn’t just Kremlin cronies who were impacted ([link removed]) . Also affected were investors that held Russia-related securities and had made transactions with financial institutions like JPMorgan & Chase, the biggest bank in the U.S.

Last year, JPMorgan lost a lawsuit in Belgium, which it launched in an attempt to free up about $2.4 billion, according to a verdict obtained by reporters. That is only a small amount of the total $270 billion in blocked transactions and frozen assets in Belgium. One lawyer estimates 80 percent might belong to “innocent people who should not actually be affected by sanctions.”

Transactions and assets have been blocked not because the owners are sanctioned. Instead, Belgian authorities have blocked transactions related to Russia’s sanctioned central bank. And they have frozen securities — including stocks and bonds — that flowed through another sanctioned entity called the National Settlement Depository, a Moscow firm that manages such investments.

Belgium is at the center of efforts to sort out what funds should remain under sanctions, and which should be released, because it hosts the European Union’s largest financial services provider, Euroclear. The Brussels-based financial clearing house has blocked transactions and frozen assets in compliance with EU sanctions against Russia.

But many unsanctioned investors want their money and assets back. They have overwhelmed Belgian authorities with requests for release, and stressed the court system, too. The situation also complicates plans to use such funds and assets to rebuild Ukraine.

“The banks whose assets are frozen are themselves sanctioned, but their clients are not,” said Alexandre De Geest, the Belgian Treasury Department’s administrator-general.

“So, when people talk about the complete confiscation of all frozen assets, do they realize that it often does not concern the property of the sanctioned bank or financial institution, but of their clients?”


** Read the full story ([link removed])
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** Slapped With Sanctions, Georgian Oligarch Ivanishvili Brings Assets Home
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Sanctions also hit the billionaire founder and honorary chair of Georgia’s ruling party in December in response to crackdowns on anti-government protests in recent months.

In the wake of the sanctions, Bidzina Ivanishvili — widely seen as the country’s informal ruler — brought a slew of assets home to Georgia ([link removed]) , shielding them from global economic pressures.

Among the transferred assets were companies that own an opulent glass and steel mansion overlooking Tbilisi, Georgia’s capital; a previously unreported luxury residence in a spa town; the former offices of the ruling Georgian Dream party; and 12,000 square meters of land within a state-owned national park.

Relocating these assets was unnecessary, experts say, since a general license also issued in December allows continued trade with his companies. But it could be a sign that Ivanishvili anticipates further international retribution. Both European and British parliaments have called for sanctions. If sanctions do deepen, his relocation of assets could make business deals in Georgia difficult and cause damage to the country as a whole, due to Ivanishvili’s outsized influence on the economy, critics fear.

Representatives of Georgian Dream declined to answer specific questions, but called sanctions against Ivanishvili “punishment,” citing his supposed refusal to go to war against Russia and for stopping revolution in his home country.


** Read the full story ([link removed])
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** OSCE Official Travelled to Event in Georgia Organized by Top Ruling Party Member
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When two old friends got together to watch a football match last September in the Georgian capital of Tbilisi, it was supposedly about sports and not politics.

But colleagues of Roberto Montella at the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) saw it differently ([link removed]) . Montella, a former football player himself, traveled to Georgia last year to watch a match against his hometown club, AC Milan. The organizer was an old friend, former AC Milan player, Kakha Kaladze, who is now mayor of Tbilisi and a top figure in the country’s controversial ruling party, Georgian Dream.

The reunion came just ahead of a pivotal parliamentary election, which OSCE, the world’s largest regional security organization, was set to monitor. As secretary general of the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly, Montella would take part in that election observation mission.

OSCE has strict rules on conduct. Its election observation guidelines state that “any potential conflicts of interest which could raise doubts in the eyes of a seemingly reasonable and neutral person… disqualifies a candidate from being an observer.”

Montella says there was no conflict of interest in his visit — which was just about enjoying sports with an old friend. The president of the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly has also defended Montella’s trip to Tbilisi for the football event organized by Kaladze. She told reporters that such friendships do “not interfere with our honest and impartial execution of our observers’ functions.”

But some experts say Kaladze has used football as a smokescreen for political lobbying.

And one OSCE colleague called for further investigation of Montella’s presence at the football event, saying: “It is crucial that we are not questioned or seen as supporting any particular party.”

Read the full story ([link removed])


** OCCRP Updates and Events
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Nonprofits that sued the U.S. government over frozen foreign aid have asked a federal judge to enforce compliance ([link removed]) with his order requiring the White House to restore the funding.

OCCRP’s parent organization and another nonprofit filed a lawsuit arguing that President Donald Trump did not have the authority to freeze international aid contracts while reviewing them. District Judge Amir Ali agreed with the nonprofits and, last week, ordered the Trump administration to stop withholding funding.

However, the White House disagreed. In a legal response, its lawyers argued that, despite the court's order, the administration still had the authority to freeze funds, enforce stop-work orders, and terminate grants. The case continues.

Join OCCRP at RightsCon 2025 February 24-27. OCCRP started the Journalism Cloud Alliance with the Global Forum for Media Development to find ways to make data storage more secure, affordable, and sustainable for investigative journalism. Next week, you can hear OCCRP co-founder Paul Radu share highlights from the effort at RightsCon, a summit focusing on human rights in the digital age. Learn more and register here ([link removed]) .
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P.S. Thanks for reading OCCRP Weekly. Feel free to reply to this email with feedback, thoughts, or questions.

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