Germany to create council to oversee restitution of colonial-era acquisitions

On 30 March, the German federal government and the country’s 16 states agreed to create a new body to oversee restitution of cultural property and human remains held in public collections that were acquired in a colonial context. The panel, called the Coordination Council for Returns of Cultural Property and Human Remains from Colonial Contexts, will include representatives of the federal government, states, and municipal authorities and will coordinate with counterparts in receiving countries, according to a joint statement issued after a meeting of state culture ministers and officials from Germany’s foreign and culture ministries. Culture minister Wolfram Weimer said the council is intended to make ongoing and future restitution processes more effective, building on a 2019 commitment to return objects taken in ways now considered legally or morally unjustifiable. Germany has already transferred ownership of more than 1,100 Benin bronzes to Nigeria in 2022 and 23 objects to Namibia in 2024, while other restitutions—such as the Ngonnso figure promised to Cameroon in 2022—remain pending.

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