Editor's note: This story was updated to include comments sent by the Dutch embassy in Ukraine.
It may be a case of stolen artwork smuggled from Ukraine’s war zone and now being used to extort a ransom from the victims. At least that’s what the evidence trail shows, according to Arthur Brand, a Dutch art crime investigator. Those in Ukraine he accuses of complicity, however, deny the accusations.
On Dec. 7, the Dutch city of Hoorn and its public Westfries Museum said 24 pieces of stolen artwork have been tracked to Ukraine. The paintings were stolen from the museum 10 years ago. The entire collection and some other stolen items were once valued at €10 million.
The Dutch are accusing members of the Ukrainian Defense Ministry’s OUN Battalion of being in possession of the 17th-18th-century collection and of using financial blackmail for their return, according to a joint news release by the city and museum.
Lydia Guzhva, the spokeswoman for the battalion, denied the accusations, saying she first heard of the Dutch paintings from news reports.
Ukraine’s former state security chief, Valentyn Nalyvaichenko, and nationalist Svoboda Party leader Oleh Tyahnybok have also been accused in “behind the scenes” attempts to sell the pieces to the Dutch Embassy. Both Nalyvaichenko and Tyahnybok denied involvement in separate comments to the Kyiv Post.
The allegations started to take shape after Brand discovered photographs of two stolen paintings. In January 2014, he found a color image of Jan Linsen’s 1627 painting “Rebecca and Eliezer” posted on an obscure Ukrainian web forum.
The Dutch were elated with the promising but inconclusive lead.
“Because the Westfries Museum is only in possession of black and white photos of the stolen art, a color representation is deemed sufficient evidence to prove that this is one of the stolen pieces,” the Dutch museum said.
A black and white photo of a stolen image of Jan Linsen’s 1627 painting “Rebecca and Eliezer”
“This was the first sign of life, and we knew for sure that it was real because of the colors,” Hoorn city spokeswoman Marike van Leeuwen said in an emailed message.
Another finding came this summer when Brand, whom the city of Hoorn had hired, claimed he received a color picture of Hendrik Bogaert’s 17th-century “A Farmer’s Wedding,” from Borys Humenyuk, then a former OUN battalion member, by email. The electronic image, obtained by the Kyiv Post, shows a Ukrainian-language newspaper attached to the painting, presumably to show that the picture was current.
The entire stolen art collection, moreover, had been found “in the war zone” of eastern Ukraine at the residence of an associate of ex-President Viktor Yanukovych, Brand claimed in phone comments to the Kyiv Post without specifying exactly where and whether it was in Russian-occupied territory.
The news comes as Holland will hold a nationwide advisory referendum on April 6 on whether to approve the parliament’s move to ratify the European Union’s association agreement with Ukraine.
Honest motives or blackmail
Humenyuk, the former OUN battalion member, told the Kyiv Post he had acted with the best of intentions.
He says he has never seen the actual stolen art collection, but heard the rumors about the paintings that were found in a house in the occupied territories near Donetsk, where OUN soldiers were stationed last year.
Humenyuk said that in July he met with three Dutch Embassy officials, one of whom was a Dutch police officer. A month later, Humenyuk met with investigator Brand in Kyiv near the Dutch Embassy. But he failed to explain the purpose of both meetings.
In an emailed response to the Kyiv Post, the Dutch embassy’s deputy head of economic affairs, Astrid Dunselman, said that Ukrainian authorities have started an investigation and that “we trust” that they “will do everything within the limits of their power to bring about a resolution.”
According to Humenyuk, Brand never showed him his credentials and offered the soldier €50,000 to recover the artwork in a “special operation” into “enemy territory.”
Brand’s account is that two OUN battalion members initially asked €50 million for the paintings and later a €5 million finder’s fee,” according to the Dutch news release.
The detective told the Kyiv Post that he never saw the actual paintings in Ukraine, but claimed that Humenyuk showed him photos of the entire stolen collection.
Guzhva of the OUN battalion said that Humenyuk was discharged from the battalion in March – before he approached the Dutch Embassy – after being suspected of theft and misuse of power.
“We didn’t find enough evidence to take to court, so we decided to fire him. We know Borys as a wealthy man, who was connected to the art market before the war,” Guzhva said.
Humenyuk currently serves in the Azov Battalion and is stationed near Donetsk, he said.
Brand said that Humenyuk is not the one to blame for any blackmail attempt, but was merely the contact person during negotiations.
“Svoboda Party leader Oleh Tyahnybok is the one to blame for the shocking blackmail. From my sources, I know that he’s even trying to sell the paintings to top European gangs. That is the final and the only truth,” Brand said.
Tyahnybok denied involvement with the stolen artwork, calling the allegations “nonsense.”
“This is some kind of a fib. Maybe this synthetic scandal is needed to cover another, more important case or upcoming event,” Tyahnybok said via Facebook messenger.
Brand proceeded next to accuse Nalyvaichenko, the former SBU chief: “Nalyvaychenko’s fault is not 100 percent. His name was mentioned two times. But he is also responsible because he was head of the Security Service of Ukraine when his people were involved in the scheme.”
Nalyvaichenko, who was fired by President Petro Poroshenko as SBU chief in July, denied all of the accusations.
“That is complete nonsense. I’m appealing to Interpol and Dutch law enforcement agencies and asking (them) to lead the investigation at a legislative level and find out who is truly guilty,” he told the Kyiv Post.
Conflicting accounts
Ukrainian authorities and high-level officials have given conflicting accounts on whether they are investigating the stolen art case.
Foreign Minister Pavlo Klimkin told Interfax-Ukraine news agency that the Interior Ministry is investigating the stolen paintings following President’s Petro Poroshenko’s visit to the Netherlands in November.
“The Dutch mentioned that case during the president’s visit. But the museum made our investigation more complicated,” Klimkin said. “Because at first they started the negotiations on their own, without the Ukrainian authorities’ participation. It was only this month (December) that the Ukrainian Interior Ministry and Dutch embassy in Kyiv joined the process.”
However, Interior Ministry spokesman Artem Shevchenko wouldn’t confirm whether an investigation is underway except to say that “tense work on that case” has started.
Holland’s Golden Age
On the morning of Jan. 10, 2005, Westfries Museum officials in Hoorn discovered that a collection of 17th-20th century artwork had been stolen, as well as 70 pieces of silverware. The majority were 21 oil paintings dated to Holland’s Golden Age. Three drawings were also stolen.
At the time, museum director Ruud Spruit told Holland’s Expatica News that the stolen works and the silverware were valued at €10 million and that they were “the heart of the museum’s collection and were irreplaceable.”
“The thieves removed the paintings from their frames, smashed glass cases to get at the silverware and kicked in museum doors,” Expatica reported. “Hoorn Culture Alderman Roger Tonnaer described the theft as a ‘disaster’ and said he hoped the thieves would soon realize that the paintings were unsaleable because they are too well known.”
Hoorn city and museum officials now fear that efforts to recover the paintings have reached a “dead end” and that the pieces might be sold on the black market, according to their statement.
“We have done everything…Now that it seems that the art works are disappearing again, we want to sound the alarm to let potential buyers know that they are dealing with stolen art, to give a correct representation of the actual value of the art works, but also to send a signal that these art works only belong in Hoorn. They are invaluable to the story we are telling about the extremely riveting period of the Golden Age in West Friesland,” museum director Ad Geerdink said.
Kyiv Post staff writer Veronika Melkozerova can be reached at [email protected]. Kyiv Post editor Mark Rachkevych contributed to this story.
