The culture minister has told the AP that the cultural history of Ukraine has been destroyed.
In an interview with The Associated Press, Oleksandr Tkachenko claimed that Russian soldiers had taken thousands of artifacts from Ukrainian museums.
A 1500-year-old golden tiara was one of the rare treasures to disappear. It was one of the most valuable artifacts from Attila the Hun.
The jewels used to be in the Museum of Local History.
A museum worker told the AP that they hid the tiara and hundreds of other artifacts. The treasures were found by the Russian troops after they searched the building.
A staff member said they didn't know where the loot was. More than 200 pieces of gold from the era of the Scythians were taken by the Russian soldiers.
Russian soldiers took artifacts from almost 40 museums, according to the culture minister.
The Russians stole thousands of items from the museum in Mariupol.
Russian soldiers, who captured the city after a ferocious siege that ended in May, made off with ancient religious icons, a unique Jewish Torah scroll, and valuable paintings by local artists, according to Mariupol's exiled city council.
The attitude of Russians towards Ukrainian culture heritage is a war crime.
Hundreds of millions of dollars were spent on the destruction of cultural sites. Several churches, museums, and cultural sites have been damaged or destroyed in the Russian invasion.
When Olena Zelenska visited a Ukrainian museum in New York, she described the attacks on culture and history as a war against our identity.
Oleksandr Symonenko, chief researcher at Ukraine's Institute of Archaeology, told the Associated Press that the lost artifacts were ancient finds. These are pieces of artwork. If culture disappears it is a disaster.
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