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TAMPA — Sunken treasure, WikiLeaks documents and a priceless French painting.
Suddenly, a great deal of international drama has touched down in Tampa and reads like a diplomatic thriller — with half a billion dollars in gold at stake.
For years, Tampa's Odyssey Marine treasure hunting company has been fighting with the Spanish government over a 17 tons of gold and silver coins that Odyssey discovered and brought up off the Atlantic Ocean floor.
Now, it turns out, Spain has been getting secret help since 2007 from an unlikely source: The U.S. government.
Among the thousands of documents released by WikiLeaks are several U.S. diplomatic cables describing how U.S. ambassadors were helping Spain in their cause — partly to help broker a deal to bring a famous painting in Spain to a U.S. citizen who claimed it was looted by the Nazis in World War II.
Specifically the U.S. offered to provide confidential customs documents prepared by Odyssey that Spain in turn planned to use in court to fight the company.
Odyssey officials are not pleased.
"The cables seem to indicate that someone in the U.S. State Department has literally offered to sacrifice Odyssey and its thousands of shareholders along with the many jobs created by the company in exchange for the return of one painting to one U.S. Citizen," the company said in a statement to the Tribune. "It is hard to believe that this really happened. It sounds like something out of a Hollywood script."
London's Guardian newspaper first reported the cables, as part of its ongoing digestion of thousands of documents released by WikiLeaks. The U.S. government has condemned the release and called for prosecution of WikiLeaks founders.
The Spanish were cool to the idea of returning the painting, the cables show, but were grateful after Department of Homeland Security staff in the U.S. embassy in Madrid handed the Spanish customs import documents that Odyssey had filed when bringing the treasure to Tampa.
"The information was confidential," the U.S. cable stated, "and to be used only for law enforcement purposes." The Spanish replied that they were "interested in obtaining the Odyssey customs information to provide to lawyers representing the [Government of Spain] in the Tampa Admiralty Court."
Odyssey found the treasure in May 2007 and has since argued that the treasure was on board a Spanish commercial vessel. The ship sank in international waters, possibly in 1804 while carrying commercial goods from Peru, Odyssey says, and was thus fair game for any salvage company that found it. Odyssey is now locked in a protracted legal battle with Spain, which claims the treasure was on a military mission at the time, and thus Spanish property forever.
A diplomatic cable a year later describes how the U.S. Ambassador to Spain, Eduardo Aguirre, suggested a deal.
He met with Spanish Minister of Culture Cesar Antonio Molina on June 30, 2008, who told the U.S. Ambassador that they should meet over the issue of a claim by an American citizen, Claude Cassirer, to recover a painting by Camille Pissarro. Cassirer claims the Nazis in 1939 forced his grandmother to sell them the painting and it passed through several hands before ending up in a Spanish museum.
"The [U.S.] ambassador noted also that while the Odyssey and Cassirer claim were on separate legal tracks," the cable states, "it was in both governments' interest to avail themselves of whatever margin for manouevre they had, consistent with their legal obligations, to resolve both matters in a way that favoured the bilateral relationship."
The Spanish official replied, the cable says, that there were many steps required before any movement on the painting, but that he had recently flown to Washington, in part, to meet with lawyers that Spain retained in the Odyssey case. He expressed "indignation" after a CNN interview where Odyssey CEO Greg Stemm aimed to keep the treasure and return only items of archeological value.
The treasure now sits in a vault warehouse in an undisclosed location. The legal case already went through federal court in Tampa, and now rests in the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta. However the case is decided, observers expect it to be appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court.
Originally posted by Unilluminist
reply to post by acrux
They aren't stuffing me over, just a bunch of idiots who would invest in something silly like sunken treasure when they know that the countries that it originally lost it usually fight to get it recovered. Even if it was 200 years, I don't think we would like it either if an American ship from that time was recovered by a foreign country, we would fight to get it and everything on there recovered for the historical value.
"The cables seem to indicate that someone in the U.S. State Department has literally offered to sacrifice Odyssey and its thousands of shareholders along with the many jobs created by the company in exchange for the return of one painting to one U.S. Citizen," the company said in a statement to the Tribune. "It is hard to believe that this really happened. It sounds like something out of a Hollywood script."
Originally posted by Unilluminist
reply to post by bigfatfurrytexan
WAAA! WAAA! somebody doesn't agree with me! Lets call him ignorant sheeple!
What an asanine ignorant response, just because someone doesn't agree with a bunch of wacky tomb raider wannabes doesn't make them sheeple. Voting for mainstream Republicans and Democrats does, watching mainstream media does, I don't do any of that, I just have my own opinion on every issue and won't let any crowd influence me, even one that is SUPPOSED to be non sheeple like the CTers here, but apparantly its not okay to have a differeing opinion without getting insulted. You are acting a lot like a sheeple, calling other CTers like me sheeple just because they might disagree on a issue to pressure people into you're opinion. That is trying to force group think on people. If you disagree, then just disagree with the message.
I happen to place greater value on our history just like other countries like Spain should then salvage rights. You have the right to the fruits of your labor, does that mean you should loot a newly discovered archeological find if it was on land? Why should it be any different on the water? I would hope my government colludes with foreign governments to recover anything we might have lost if this happens to us, we have had lots of ships sunk over the same time period.
Originally posted by Unilluminist
reply to post by backinblack
Despite that, I don't really care about a secretive elitist company until they show themselves to be otherwise. The Spanish define that ship as military and not commercial because thats what it was. It was working on behalf of the Spanish government, it wasn't a private merchant vessel with that much money on board it, that must have been tax revenue from their colonies, maybe they have some claim to that also, but that is between them and Spain. Also why is Odyssey so concerned about the release of customs documents to the Spanish unless they are trying to hide something? Even if it is wrong to release it because it was confidential, how can it harm them unless they are lying about what they found?
As for the painting, it seems it is private property if the guy who is claiming it can prove his grandmother did legitmatley own the painting and was forced to sell it. If that is true, then the grandson should receive it, and is right to claim it as personal property. He is not claiming it on behalf of the US, the US is just helping him because he is a citizen here now.
Shipwrecks and the law
Military wrecks, however, remain under the jurisdiction–and hence protection–of the government that lost the ship, or that government's successor. Hence, a German U-boat from World War II still technically belongs to the German government, even though the Third Reich is long-defunct. Many military wrecks are also protected by virtue of their being war graves.
en.wikipedia.org...
Black Swan Project
The Black Swan Project is the project name given by Odyssey Marine Exploration for its discovery and recovery of an estimated $500 million (£253 million) worth of silver and gold coins, from a shipwreck, rumored to be the Merchant Royal, which sank about 40 miles (64 km) off the coast of Gibraltar in 1641.[1] The Odyssey team believes wreck might be the Nuestra Señora de las Mercedes, which sank off Portugal in 1804, but remains uncertain as to the true identity.
en.wikipedia.org...
The Nuestra Señora de las Mercedes (Our Lady of Mercy in English [3]) was a Spanish frigate which was sunk by the British off the south coast of Portugal on 5 October 1804 during the Battle of Cape Santa Maria.
en.wikipedia.org...
2012: The test for American leadership- Alan Keyes
While Glenn Beck was focusing on George Soros as the Machiavellian "eminence grise" behind a whole slew of Democratic left-wingers, Justin Elliot, a commentator at Salon.com, wryly made note of the fact that "one of Sarah Palin's top aides has been on Soros' payroll for years. That would be Republican lobbyist Randy Scheunemann, Palin's foreign-policy adviser and a member of her small inner circle." Not surprisingly, Scheunemann is one of the advisers Palin acquired through her association with John McCain. McCain's creative reliance on George Soros as a source of funds for his political advisers and associates is well-documented and ought to be well-known
www.wnd.com...
Sarah Palin Is JUST Another Neo-Con!
www.youtube.com...