The risk of a serious cyber attack on civil nuclear infrastructure is growing, as facilities become ever more reliant on digital systems and make increasing use of commercial ‘off-the-shelf’ software, according to a major new report from Chatham House.

Cyber Security at Civil Nuclear Facilities: Understanding the Risks is the result of an 18-month study that draws on in-depth interviews with 30 leading industry practitioners based in more than eight countries. It found that the trend to digitization, when combined with a lack of executive-level awareness of the risks involved, means that nuclear plant personnel may not realize the full extent of their cyber vulnerability and are thus inadequately prepared to deal with potential attacks. 

Specific findings include:                

• The conventional belief that all nuclear facilities are ‘air gapped’ (isolated from the public internet) is a myth. The commercial benefits of internet connectivity mean that a number of nuclear facilities now have VPN connections installed, which facility operators are sometimes unaware of.
• Search engines can readily identify critical infrastructure components with such connections.
• Even where facilities are air gapped, this safeguard can be breached with nothing more than a flash drive.
• Supply chain vulnerabilities mean that equipment used at a nuclear facility risks compromise at any stage.
• A lack of training, combined with communication breakdowns between engineers and security personnel, means that nuclear plant personnel often lack an understanding of key cyber security procedures.
• Reactive rather than proactive approaches to cyber security contribute to the possibility that a nuclear facility might not know of a cyber attack until it is already substantially under way.

In the light of these risks, the report outlines a blend of policy and technical measures that will be required to counter the threats and meet the challenges. 

Recommendations include:

• Developing guidelines to measure cyber security risk in the nuclear industry, including an integrated risk assessment that takes both security and safety measures into account.
• Engaging in robust dialogue with engineers and contractors to raise awareness of the cyber security risk, including the dangers of setting up unauthorized internet connections.
• Implementing rules, where not already in place, to promote good IT hygiene in nuclear facilities (for example to forbid the use of personal devices) and enforcing rules where they do exist.
• Improving disclosure by encouraging anonymous information sharing and the establishment of industrial CERTs (Computer Emergency Response Team).
• Encouraging universal adoption of regulatory standards.

On 10 September, US National Security Advisor John Bolton used his first major speech since joining the White House to attack the International Criminal Court’s (ICC) potential investigation of American personnel in Afghanistan. The ‘American patriots’, as Bolton describes them, are being investigated for potential torture and ill-treatment of detainees, mostly in 2003 and 2004, during the United States-led invasion of the country.

Bolton has a long history of opposition to the ICC. Although the US signed the ICC Statute under president Bill Clinton, it was ‘unsigned’ by Bolton, then an under-secretary of state in the George W Bush administration.

And when the court first opened its doors in 2002, Bolton helped secure, in what he described on 10 September as one of his ‘proudest achievements’, around 100 bilateral agreements with other countries to prevent them from delivering US personnel to the ICC. Those agreements were often extracted under pressure, with the US threatening to cut off military and other aid to countries that refused to sign.

In recent years under the Obama administration, relations between the US and the ICC improved, and the US offered help and support to the court. Bolton’s attack is aimed at reversing those gains – with measures aimed directly at the court and its staff.

These include: (i) negotiating ‘even more binding, bilateral agreements to prohibit nations from surrendering US persons to the ICC’; (ii) banning ICC judges and prosecutors from entering the US, sanctioning their funds in the US financial system and prosecuting them in the US criminal courts (and doing the ‘same for any company or state that assists an ICC investigation of Americans’); and (iii) ‘taking note if any countries cooperate with ICC investigations of the United States and its allies, and remember[ing] that cooperation when setting US foreign assistance, military assistance and intelligence sharing levels’.

These are serious threats – they would potentially undermine the work of a court that is designed to prosecute the world’s worst crimes. The ICC prosecutor and its judges would be barred entry from the US to attend to vital work of the court.

Some of that work, ironically, is at the behest of the US. For instance, two of the UN Security Council’s referrals to the ICC, one in relation to atrocities committed in Sudan, the other in respect of the crimes committed by Muammar Gaddafi in Libya, were referred with US support. 

Also, the meetings of the ICC Assembly of States Parties are held each year at UN headquarters in New York. Those meetings may have to be held elsewhere if the ICC judges and staff are under threat of arrest.

In the case of the potential torture linked to operations in Afghanistan, the ICC has not been acting on its own initiative in investigating. For example, the Center for Constitutional Rights submitted ‘victim’s representations’ to the ICC on behalf of two of their clients, Sharqawi Al Hajj and Guled Hassan Duran, emphasizing the importance of an ICC investigation of US officials for serious crimes arising out of post-9/11 detention and interrogations.

According to the center, both Al Hajj and Duran were detained by the CIA in black sites or 'proxy-detention' by other countries, tormented and tortured.

Although the US is not a party to the ICC Statute, Afghanistan is, and therefore the court has jurisdiction over US nationals who allegedly committed atrocities in Afghanistan. And it should be noted that the investigation includes pursuing any atrocities committed by the Taliban and Afghan security forces during the same period.

So the basis for attacking the work of the ICC based on this is shaky, and Bolton’s threats raise a number of important international law questions going forward. 

For one, they may be unlawful retaliatory steps, given that the US has obligations to accord at least some privileges and immunities to judges and other personnel of the ICC under the 1947 UN Headquarters Agreement between the UN and US. Counter-measures might be considered by member states of the ICC, either alone, or collectively. 

In this regard, Bolton’s comments about the EU will not go unnoticed: he suggests Europe is a region where ‘the global governance dogma is strong’. The US may yet come to learn just how strong that ‘dogma’ is.

With US abstention from the ICC, the opening remains for Europe and other regions to position themselves at the heart of the international criminal justice regime, thereby – as in response to the US attitude towards climate change – building a network of partnerships with other like-minded nations to compensate for US disengagement.

Further, while the ICC has many critics, and could be improved as an institution, Bolton’s speech may have the effect of galvanizing support for the world’s first permanent international criminal court. That could be a good thing for the court, which is sorely in need of support for its work.

Whatever concerns states may have about the ICC, they may be outweighed by a mutual desire to stand up to perceived bullying by the Trump administration, in favour of the international rule of law. 

International law applies to cyber operations – but views differ on exactly how. Does state-sponsored interference in another state's affairs using cyber means – for example,  disinformation campaigns in elections, disabling government websites, or disrupting transport systems – breach international law? If so, on what basis and how are the principles of sovereignty and non-intervention relevant? States are increasingly attributing cyber operations to other states and engaging in the debate on how international law applies, including circumstances that would justify countermeasures.

As states meet to debate these issues at the UN, the panel will explore how international law regulates cyberoperations by states, consider the prospects of progress at the UN, and assess the value of other initiatives.

This event coincides with the launch of a Chatham House research paper which analyses how the principles of sovereignty and intervention apply in the context of cyberoperations, and considers a way forward for agreeing a common understanding of cyber norms.

This event will bring together a broad group of actors, including policymakers, the private sector, legal experts and civil society, and will be followed by a drinks reception.

Summary

• The vast majority of state-to-state cyberattacks consist of persistent, low-level intrusions that take place below the threshold of use of force. International law, including the principle of non-intervention in another state’s internal affairs and the principle of sovereignty, applies to these cyber operations.
• It is not clear whether any unauthorized cyber intrusion would violate the target state’s sovereignty, or whether there is a threshold in operation. While some would like to set limits by reference to effects of the cyber activity, at this time such limits are not reflected in customary international law. The assessment of whether sovereignty has been violated therefore has to be made on a case by case basis, if no other more specific rules of international law apply.
• In due course, further state practice and opinio iuris may give rise to an emerging cyber-specific understanding of sovereignty, just as specific rules deriving from the sovereignty principle have crystallized in other areas of international law.
• Before a principle of due diligence can be invoked in the cyber context, further work is needed by states to agree upon rules as to what might be expected of a state in this context.
• The principle of non-intervention applies to a state’s cyber operations as it does to other state activities. It consists of coercive behaviour by one state that deprives the target state of its free will in relation to the exercise of its sovereign functions in order to compel an outcome in, or conduct with respect to, a matter reserved to the target state.
• In practice, activities that contravene the non-intervention principle and activities that violates sovereignty will often overlap.
• In order to reach agreement on how international law applies to states’ cyber operations below the level of use of force, states should put their views on record, where possible giving examples of when they consider that an obligation may be breached, as states such as the UK, Australia, France and the Netherlands have done.
• Further discussion between states should focus on how the rules apply to practical examples of state-sponsored cyber operations. There is likely to be more commonality about specific applications of the law than there is about abstract principles.
• The prospects of a general treaty in this area are still far off. In due course, there may be benefit in considering limited rules, for example on due diligence and a prohibition on attacking critical infrastructure, before tackling broad principles.

After President Trump decided to halt a missile attack on Iran in response to the downing of a US drone, it was revealed that the US had conducted cyberattacks on Iranian weapons systems to prevent Iran launching missiles against US assets in the region.

This ‘left-of-launch’ strategy – the pre-emptive action to prevent an adversary launch missiles – has been part of the US missile defence strategy for some time now. President George W Bush asked the US military and intelligence community to infiltrate the supply chain of North Korean missiles. It was claimed that the US hacked the North Korean ballistic missile programme, causing a failed ballistic missile test, in 2012.

It was not clear then – or now – whether these ‘left-of-launch’ cyberattacks aimed at North Korea were successful as described or whether they were primarily a bluff. But that is somewhat irrelevant; the belief in the possibility and the understanding of the potential impact of such cyber capabilities undermines North Korean or Iranian confidence in their abilities to launch their missiles. In times of conflict, loss of confidence in weapons systems may lead to escalation.

In other words, the adversary may be left with no option but to take the chance to use these missiles or to lose them in a conflict setting. ‘Left of launch’ is a dangerous game. If it is based on a bluff, it could be called upon and lead to deterrence failure. If it is based on real action, then it could create an asymmetrical power struggle. If the attacker establishes false confidence in the power of a cyber weapon, then it might lead to false signalling and messaging.

This is the new normal. The cat-and-mouse game has to be taken seriously, not least because missile systems are so vulnerable.

There are several ways an offensive cyber operation against missile systems might work. These include exploiting missile designs, altering software or hardware, or creating clandestine pathways to the missile command and control systems.

They can also be attacked in space, targeting space assets and their link to strategic systems.

Most missile systems rely, at least in part, on digital information that comes from or via space-based or space-dependent assets such as: communication satellites; satellites that provide position, navigation and timing (PNT) information (for example GPS or Galileo); weather satellites to help predict flight paths, accurate targeting and launch conditions; and remote imagery satellites to assist with information and intelligence for the planning and targeting.

Missile launches themselves depend on 1) the command and control systems of the missiles, 2) the way in which information is transmitted to the missile launch facilities and 3) the way in which information is transmitted to the missiles themselves in flight. All these aspects rely on space technology.

In addition, the ground stations that transmit and receive data to and from satellites are also vulnerable to cyberattack – either through their known and unknown internet connectivity or through malicious use of flash drives that contain a deliberate cyber infection.

Non-space-based communications systems that use cable and ground-to-air-to-ground masts are likewise under threat from cyberattacks that find their way in via internet connectivity, proximity interference or memory sticks. Human error in introducing connectivity via phones, laptops and external drives, and in clicking on malicious links in sophisticated phishing lures, is common in facilitating inadvertent connectivity and malware infection.

All of these can create a military capacity able to interfere with missile launches. Malware might have been sitting on the missile command and control system for months or even years, remaining inactivated until a chosen time or by a trigger that sets in motion a disruption either to the launch or to the flight path of the missile. The country that launches the missile that either fails to launch or fails to reach the target may never know if this was the result of a design flaw, a common malfunction or a deliberate cyberattack.

States with these capabilities must exercise caution: cyber offence manoeuvres may prevent the launch of missile attacks against US assets in the Middle East or in the Pacific regions, but they may also interfere with US missile launches in the future. Even, as has recently been revealed, US cyber weapons targeting an adversary may blow back and inadvertently infect US systems. Nobody is invulnerable.

Violations against cultural property – such as archaeological treasures, artworks, museums or historical sites – can be no less detrimental to the survival of a nation than the physical persecution of its people. These assaults on heritage ensure the hegemony of some nations and distort the imprint of other nations in world history, sometimes to the point of eradication.

As contemporary armed conflicts in Syria, Ukraine and Yemen demonstrate, cultural property violations are not only a matter of the colonial past; they continue to be perpetrated, often in new, intricate ways.

Understandably, from a moral perspective, it is more often the suffering of persons, rather than any kind of ‘cultural’ destruction, that receives the most attention from humanitarian aid providers, the media or the courts. Indeed, the extent of the damage caused by an assault on cultural property is not always immediately evident, but the result can be a threat to the survival of a people. This is strikingly exemplified by what is currently happening in Crimea.

Ukraine’s Crimean peninsula has been occupied by Russia since February 2014, meaning that, under international law, the two states have been involved in an international armed conflict for the last six years.

While much attention has been paid to the alleged war crimes perpetrated by the occupying power, reports by international organizations and the International Criminal Court (ICC) have been less vocal on the issue of cultural property in Crimea. Where they do raise it, they tend to confine their findings to the issue of misappropriation.

However, as part of its larger policy of the annexation and Russification of the peninsula and its history, Russia has gone far beyond misappropriation.

Crimean artefacts have been transferred to Russia – without security justification or Ukrainian authorization as required by the international law of occupation – to be showcased at exhibitions celebrating Russia’s own cultural heritage. In 2016, the Tretyakov Gallery in Moscow staged its record-breaking Aivazovsky exhibition, which included 38 artworks from the Aivazovsky Museum in the Crimean town of Feodosia.

Other ‘cultural’ violations in the region include numerous unsanctioned archaeological excavations, whose findings are often unlawfully exported to Russia or end up on the black market.

There is also the example of Russia’s plan to establish a museum of Christianity in Ukraine’s UNESCO World Heritage site, the Ancient City of Tauric Chersonese. This is an indication of Russia’s policy of asserting itself as a bastion of Orthodox Christianity and culture in the Slavic world, with Crimea as one of the centres.

The harmful effects of Russia’s destructive cultural property policy can be seen in the situation of the Crimean Tatars, Ukraine’s indigenous Muslim people. Already depleted by a Stalin-ordered deportation in 1944 and previously repressed by the Russian Empire, the Crimean Tatars are now facing the destruction of much of the remainder of their heritage.

For example, Muslim burial grounds have been demolished to build the Tavrida Highway, which leads to the newly built Kerch Bridge connecting the peninsula to Russia.

The destructive reconstruction of the 16th-century Bakhchysarai Palace – the only remaining complete architectural ensemble of the indigenous people, included in the UNESCO World Heritage Tentative List – is another example of how the very identity of the Crimean Tatars is being threatened. This reconstruction is being conducted by a team with no experience of cultural sites, in a manner that erodes its authenticity and historical value – which is precisely as Russia intends.

There is a solid body of international and domestic law covering Russia’s treatment of Crimea’s cultural property.

Under the 1954 Hague Convention for the Protection of Cultural Property in the Event of Armed Conflict – ratified by both Ukraine and Russia – the occupying power must facilitate the safeguarding efforts of the national authorities in occupied territories. States parties must prevent any vandalism or misappropriation of cultural property, and, according to the first protocol of the convention, the occupying power is required to prevent any export of artefacts from the occupied territory.

The 1907 Hague Regulations and the 1949 Fourth Geneva Convention confirm that the authentic domestic legislation continues to apply in occupied territories. This leaves Russia with no excuse for non-compliance with Ukraine’s cultural property laws and imposing its own rules unless absolutely necessary.

Besides, both Ukrainian and Russian criminal codes penalise pillage in occupied territory, as well as unsanctioned archaeological excavations. As an occupying power, Russia must not just abstain from such wrongdoings in Crimea, but also duly investigate and prosecute the alleged misconduct.

The clarity of the international legal situation demonstrates that no exhibitions in continental Russia and no archaeological excavations which are not sanctioned by Ukraine can be justified. Likewise, any renovation or use of cultural sites, especially those on permanent or tentative UNESCO lists, must only be conducted pursuant to consultancy with and approval of the Ukrainian authorities.

But the resonance of the Crimean case goes beyond law and touches on issues of the very survival of a people. The Soviet deportation of the Crimean Tatars in 1944 did not only result in the deaths of individuals. Their footprints in Crimea have been gradually erased by baseless treason charges, the long exile of the indigenous community from their native lands and ongoing persecution.

First the Soviet Union and now Russia have targeted the Crimean Tatars’ cultural heritage to undermine their significance in the general historical narrative, making attempts to preserve or celebrate this culture seem futile. Russia is thus imposing its own historical and political hegemony at the expense of the Crimean Tatar and Ukrainian layers of Crimean history.

As exemplified by occupied Crimea, the manipulation and exploitation of cultural heritage can serve an occupying power’s wider policies of appropriating history and asserting its own dominance. Domestic cultural property proceedings are challenging due to the lack of access to the occupied territory, but they should still be pursued.

More effort is needed in the following areas: case prioritization; informing the documenters of alleged violations about the spectrum of cultural property crimes; developing domestic investigative and prosecutorial capacity, including by involving foreign expert consultancy; more proactively seeking bilateral and multilateral cooperation in art crime cases; liaising with auction houses (to track down objects originating from war-affected areas) and museums (to prevent the exhibition of the artefacts from occupied territories).

When possible, cultural property crimes should also be reported to the ICC.

Additionally, more international – public, policy, media and jurisprudential – attention to such violations is needed. Societies, courts and policymakers should have a clearer awareness that assaults against cultural heritage constitute a creeping encroachment on a people’s identity, endangering its very survival.

International law applies to cyber operations – but views differ on exactly how. Does state-sponsored interference in another state's affairs using cyber means – for example,  disinformation campaigns in elections, disabling government websites, or disrupting transport systems – breach international law? If so, on what basis and how are the principles of sovereignty and non-intervention relevant? States are increasingly attributing cyber operations to other states and engaging in the debate on how international law applies, including circumstances that would justify countermeasures.

As states meet to debate these issues at the UN, the panel will explore how international law regulates cyberoperations by states, consider the prospects of progress at the UN, and assess the value of other initiatives.

This event coincides with the launch of a Chatham House research paper which analyses how the principles of sovereignty and intervention apply in the context of cyberoperations, and considers a way forward for agreeing a common understanding of cyber norms.

This event will bring together a broad group of actors, including policymakers, the private sector, legal experts and civil society, and will be followed by a drinks reception.

Summary

• The vast majority of state-to-state cyberattacks consist of persistent, low-level intrusions that take place below the threshold of use of force. International law, including the principle of non-intervention in another state’s internal affairs and the principle of sovereignty, applies to these cyber operations.
• It is not clear whether any unauthorized cyber intrusion would violate the target state’s sovereignty, or whether there is a threshold in operation. While some would like to set limits by reference to effects of the cyber activity, at this time such limits are not reflected in customary international law. The assessment of whether sovereignty has been violated therefore has to be made on a case by case basis, if no other more specific rules of international law apply.
• In due course, further state practice and opinio iuris may give rise to an emerging cyber-specific understanding of sovereignty, just as specific rules deriving from the sovereignty principle have crystallized in other areas of international law.
• Before a principle of due diligence can be invoked in the cyber context, further work is needed by states to agree upon rules as to what might be expected of a state in this context.
• The principle of non-intervention applies to a state’s cyber operations as it does to other state activities. It consists of coercive behaviour by one state that deprives the target state of its free will in relation to the exercise of its sovereign functions in order to compel an outcome in, or conduct with respect to, a matter reserved to the target state.
• In practice, activities that contravene the non-intervention principle and activities that violates sovereignty will often overlap.
• In order to reach agreement on how international law applies to states’ cyber operations below the level of use of force, states should put their views on record, where possible giving examples of when they consider that an obligation may be breached, as states such as the UK, Australia, France and the Netherlands have done.
• Further discussion between states should focus on how the rules apply to practical examples of state-sponsored cyber operations. There is likely to be more commonality about specific applications of the law than there is about abstract principles.
• The prospects of a general treaty in this area are still far off. In due course, there may be benefit in considering limited rules, for example on due diligence and a prohibition on attacking critical infrastructure, before tackling broad principles.

Violations against cultural property – such as archaeological treasures, artworks, museums or historical sites – can be no less detrimental to the survival of a nation than the physical persecution of its people. These assaults on heritage ensure the hegemony of some nations and distort the imprint of other nations in world history, sometimes to the point of eradication.

As contemporary armed conflicts in Syria, Ukraine and Yemen demonstrate, cultural property violations are not only a matter of the colonial past; they continue to be perpetrated, often in new, intricate ways.

Understandably, from a moral perspective, it is more often the suffering of persons, rather than any kind of ‘cultural’ destruction, that receives the most attention from humanitarian aid providers, the media or the courts. Indeed, the extent of the damage caused by an assault on cultural property is not always immediately evident, but the result can be a threat to the survival of a people. This is strikingly exemplified by what is currently happening in Crimea.

Ukraine’s Crimean peninsula has been occupied by Russia since February 2014, meaning that, under international law, the two states have been involved in an international armed conflict for the last six years.

While much attention has been paid to the alleged war crimes perpetrated by the occupying power, reports by international organizations and the International Criminal Court (ICC) have been less vocal on the issue of cultural property in Crimea. Where they do raise it, they tend to confine their findings to the issue of misappropriation.

However, as part of its larger policy of the annexation and Russification of the peninsula and its history, Russia has gone far beyond misappropriation.

Crimean artefacts have been transferred to Russia – without security justification or Ukrainian authorization as required by the international law of occupation – to be showcased at exhibitions celebrating Russia’s own cultural heritage. In 2016, the Tretyakov Gallery in Moscow staged its record-breaking Aivazovsky exhibition, which included 38 artworks from the Aivazovsky Museum in the Crimean town of Feodosia.

Other ‘cultural’ violations in the region include numerous unsanctioned archaeological excavations, whose findings are often unlawfully exported to Russia or end up on the black market.

There is also the example of Russia’s plan to establish a museum of Christianity in Ukraine’s UNESCO World Heritage site, the Ancient City of Tauric Chersonese. This is an indication of Russia’s policy of asserting itself as a bastion of Orthodox Christianity and culture in the Slavic world, with Crimea as one of the centres.

The harmful effects of Russia’s destructive cultural property policy can be seen in the situation of the Crimean Tatars, Ukraine’s indigenous Muslim people. Already depleted by a Stalin-ordered deportation in 1944 and previously repressed by the Russian Empire, the Crimean Tatars are now facing the destruction of much of the remainder of their heritage.

For example, Muslim burial grounds have been demolished to build the Tavrida Highway, which leads to the newly built Kerch Bridge connecting the peninsula to Russia.

The destructive reconstruction of the 16th-century Bakhchysarai Palace – the only remaining complete architectural ensemble of the indigenous people, included in the UNESCO World Heritage Tentative List – is another example of how the very identity of the Crimean Tatars is being threatened. This reconstruction is being conducted by a team with no experience of cultural sites, in a manner that erodes its authenticity and historical value – which is precisely as Russia intends.

There is a solid body of international and domestic law covering Russia’s treatment of Crimea’s cultural property.

Under the 1954 Hague Convention for the Protection of Cultural Property in the Event of Armed Conflict – ratified by both Ukraine and Russia – the occupying power must facilitate the safeguarding efforts of the national authorities in occupied territories. States parties must prevent any vandalism or misappropriation of cultural property, and, according to the first protocol of the convention, the occupying power is required to prevent any export of artefacts from the occupied territory.

The 1907 Hague Regulations and the 1949 Fourth Geneva Convention confirm that the authentic domestic legislation continues to apply in occupied territories. This leaves Russia with no excuse for non-compliance with Ukraine’s cultural property laws and imposing its own rules unless absolutely necessary.

Besides, both Ukrainian and Russian criminal codes penalise pillage in occupied territory, as well as unsanctioned archaeological excavations. As an occupying power, Russia must not just abstain from such wrongdoings in Crimea, but also duly investigate and prosecute the alleged misconduct.

The clarity of the international legal situation demonstrates that no exhibitions in continental Russia and no archaeological excavations which are not sanctioned by Ukraine can be justified. Likewise, any renovation or use of cultural sites, especially those on permanent or tentative UNESCO lists, must only be conducted pursuant to consultancy with and approval of the Ukrainian authorities.

But the resonance of the Crimean case goes beyond law and touches on issues of the very survival of a people. The Soviet deportation of the Crimean Tatars in 1944 did not only result in the deaths of individuals. Their footprints in Crimea have been gradually erased by baseless treason charges, the long exile of the indigenous community from their native lands and ongoing persecution.

First the Soviet Union and now Russia have targeted the Crimean Tatars’ cultural heritage to undermine their significance in the general historical narrative, making attempts to preserve or celebrate this culture seem futile. Russia is thus imposing its own historical and political hegemony at the expense of the Crimean Tatar and Ukrainian layers of Crimean history.

As exemplified by occupied Crimea, the manipulation and exploitation of cultural heritage can serve an occupying power’s wider policies of appropriating history and asserting its own dominance. Domestic cultural property proceedings are challenging due to the lack of access to the occupied territory, but they should still be pursued.

More effort is needed in the following areas: case prioritization; informing the documenters of alleged violations about the spectrum of cultural property crimes; developing domestic investigative and prosecutorial capacity, including by involving foreign expert consultancy; more proactively seeking bilateral and multilateral cooperation in art crime cases; liaising with auction houses (to track down objects originating from war-affected areas) and museums (to prevent the exhibition of the artefacts from occupied territories).

When possible, cultural property crimes should also be reported to the ICC.

Additionally, more international – public, policy, media and jurisprudential – attention to such violations is needed. Societies, courts and policymakers should have a clearer awareness that assaults against cultural heritage constitute a creeping encroachment on a people’s identity, endangering its very survival.