The State Hermitage Museum on Withdrawing of Police Protection: Vandals will be Free to Destroy the Museums

Yulia Kantor, Head of Historical and Informational Service of the State Hermitage Museum, commented on the situation with the reductions carried out by the Ministry of Interior where the majority of the dismissals will concern the independent security service. She noted that the position of the museums is indicated in the statement of Mikhail Piotrovsky, Director of the State Hermitage Museum, who is the president of the Union of Museums of Russia.

Yulia Kantor says, “It is an issue of a corporation rather than of a single federal museum. Of course, the removal of independent security services representing public protection from the museums is fraught with terrible consequences, both moral and material. It provokes the absolute impunity of those who can commit malicious acts against the exhibits and the museum visitors”.

The Hermitage representative stressed that private security companies cannot fully replace the police. Employees of private security companies do not have the right to carry weapons of war, to frisk suspicious persons or to truss up and detain criminals. In exceptional cases they do, but, in the end, litigation claims may be brought against them. Therefore, a private security guard will think twice before using force.

Yulia Kantor reminded, “The case of the Moscow Manege and vandalism against the works of art have shown utter helplessness of the most private security companies. The exhibition “Sculptures, which we do not see” was not guarded by the police, rather by a private security company, and it resulted in destruction by vandals. This means that the museums are subject to the strongest danger and if the state considers it possible to remove the protection from the museums while carrying out reductions, it is a catastrophic mistake. It turns out that the most important thing that should be protected by the state, being culture, cultural facilities and the people’s right to culture guaranteed by the Constitution, is actually left unprotected”.

Major museums such as the Hermitage have their own large, branched and well-equipped security services. The rest of the museums, also being under the federal jurisdiction, are now under a direct threat.

The Main Directorate of the Ministry of the Interior in St. Petersburg and Leningrad Region did not give the cultural workers any clear explanations. It simply confronted them with an accomplished fact by notifying that since 1 November, according to the decision of the Ministry, the police will not service these facilities.

The Hermitage representative says, “The museum community is hoping that by 1 November, when this catastrophe might occur, the issue will be duly resolved”.

The institutions have not yet discussed the pessimistic plans of what to do in November, if the decision made by the Ministry of Interior will not be reconsidered. Presumably, the top five museums in the country, including the Hermitage, the Russian Museum and the Tretyakov Gallery will be granted this protection as an exception. The rest will be left unprotected. Their Heads are wondering how to get out of the situation, should they really give a granny custodian a shotgun and make her protect the entrance? Presumably, the Ministry of Interior will cancel the order anyway; the only question is whether it will be done before November or at the end of the experiment and a chain reaction of offenses.

Yulia Kantor says, “The museums don’t have money for contracting private security companies, the budget of the Ministry of Culture does not suggest it. It’s horrible. It seems that criminals are given time for sacking the museums and committing acts of violence”.

An employee of the independent security service of the Main Directorate of the Ministry of the Interior in St. Petersburg and Leningrad Region told the News agency anonymously that the 1st and 2nd regiments of the Independent Security Directorate are subject to dismissal. The first regiment guards the museums, the second - the archives. The police are informed that the contracts will be terminated and they will be dismissed since 1 November. Some of them may still be transferred to other departments, but almost all the women of the independent security service will be on the street without any assistance in finding employment. There will be no social guarantees, and it is unclear even whether the salaries will be paid at all. The Heads are executing the Ministry order without arguments and the worried police of the aft level are urged to refrain from questions. The personnel has already accepted and signed the papers for dismissal.
 
Read more: http://ianews.ru/articles/66314/