The financing of terrorism and terrorist organizations takes place in several ways, including the trafficking of cultural goods that are looted by terrorist organizations and then smuggled through established smuggling routes to the neighbouring as well as more distant countries where these cultural goods are sold. The international community recognized the destruction and looting of cultural property as a threat to international peace and security, as well as a threat to identity, tradition, culture and knowledge of our past, and UNESCO has described the destruction of cultural heritage as cultural cleansing or culturocide. Following the extremely extensive destruction of cultural heritage sites in Syria and Iraq over the past few years, the international community has responded with a number of public condemnations, suggestions, new international legal instruments calling on countries to adopt stricter legislation, co-operate, exchange information and prosecute perpetrators. The initiatives to define a special crime, i.e. cultural cleansing, on the basis of which the perpetrators could be punished, are becoming more and more louder, even though there is a legal basis for punishment in the currently valid international legal acts.
The purpose of this master's thesis is to confirm or disprove the following hypothesis: »International legal regime, which allows to prevent the destruction and trafficking of cultural property for the purposes of financing terrorism and punishing the perpetrators, is appropriate.« The first part presents the most important international legal acts in the field of the fight against terrorism, followed by a critical discussion on the international legal regime of the prevention of the financing of terrorism. The third part contains an overview of terrorist financing through the trafficking of cultural property with special emphasis on the practice of trafficking of cultural property of the Islamic State and the responses of the international community and international legal acts in the field of protection of cultural goods.
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