The European Union is finally beginning to sanction Russian actors responsible for the erasure of Ukrainian cultural heritage. It is now urgent that ICOM do the same!

This Tuesday, May 20, 2025, the European Union adopted a 17th package of sanctions

against Russia. "For Ukraine, for their freedom and ours!" is pleased that the name of Elena Morozova, director of the "National Museum of Tauric Chersonese" has been added to the list of people affected by these sanctions.

For the first time, the European Union, by sanctioning this individual, is acknowledging the practices of those involved in the policy of erasing Ukraine's cultural heritage. Thus, Ms. Morozova assumes not only responsibility for the dismantling of Chersonesus, an archaeological site listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site, but also the management of a museum complex promoting Novorossiya and intended to promote a narrative justifying Russian claims to reconquer the eastern and southern regions of Crimea. Furthermore, the European Union indicates that this site constitutes a logistical base for troops deployed on the front line!

Ms. Morozova's case is not an isolated one. Since the annexation of Crimea and the outbreak of hostilities in Donbass in 2014, and since the launch of the full-scale invasion in February 2022, Moscow has clearly premeditated and implemented a component of its conquest plan aimed at erasing Ukraine's cultural identity.

Numerous documented facts attest to this desire, notably the systematic looting of art objects exhibited in museums in Kherson, Mariupol, Melitopol, or the deployment of Russian museum directors whose vocation is to implement methodological recommendations dictated by the Russian Ministry of Culture and who are qualified to put together exhibitions devoted to the history of the "Special Military Operation"...

This is the case, for example, of Yuriy Komlev, director of the Orenburg Museum of Fine Arts, member of the ICLCM board, which is one of ICOM's international committees, and recently awarded the Dimitri Likhatchov Prize, awarded during the annual Russian festival "Inter-Museum" and recognizing its holder as "the museum director of the year." A well-deserved prize since on social networks, Mr. Komlev regularly communicates about his work on Russification of museums located in the Donetsk oblast...

This policy of Russification of the occupied territories is clearly claimed and assumed by the President of ICOM Russia, Vassily Pankratov, in his response last October to the request for explanations from the President of ICOM, as in the one he gave a few days ago on social networks in response to the column that we published in the daily newspaper "Le Monde" on May 6, a column calling for the exclusion of ICOM Russia from ICOM, for facts now denounced by the European Union.

ICOM is therefore faced with its responsibilities. While the President of ICOM Russia suggests in his latest response that ICOM tolerates acts constituting crimes against humanity, it is urgent that the Board of Directors of this organization assume responsibility for the content of its statutes, its internal regulations and its code of ethics by excluding ICOM Russia and the members of this committee who carry out acts comparable to those carried out by Ms. Morozova or Mr. Komlev.

The reputation of ICOM and the honour of the curators and museum directors who are members of this organisation are now at stake.