Belgium has zero success rate in solving art thefts

Belgium's federal police force has solved zero cases of art and antiques theft in the past year, after a specialist investigative unit was cut to just one person.

Lucas Verhaegen, an expert in cultural property crime at the General Directorate of the Judicial Police, told a Belgian Senate committee that the success rate in solving these crimes had previously been about 6-7 percent before the police sacked three experts from its art and antiquities team last year.

The unit works with Interpol, foreign police forces and customs officers to coordinate cross-border investigations into stolen works of art.

CD&V senator Sabine de Bethune said it was short-sighted to pull resources away from investigating art thefts, when this type of crime is closely linked to the funding of organised crime and terrorism.

Verhaegen told the Senate committee that seized works of art often came from conflict countries including Syria, Iraq and Libya.

Earlier this year Edouard Planché, the head of Unesco's campaign against the traffic of art works, identified Belgium as a "weak link in the fight against trafficking in cultural property".