1,100 articles on historical and cultural value stolen in Russia in 2009.

MOSCOW, March 18 (Itar-Tass) - A total of 1,100 articles of historical and cultural value were reported to be stolen in Russia in 2009, with losses totalling 72 million roubles, a top-ranking interior ministry official told journalists on Thursday.

According to Vladimir Kulikov, deputy head of the interior ministry's
private security control centre, police prevented 12 attempts to steal
historical and archive valuables in 2009. He blamed poor safety conditions
of the cultural facilities on the lack of guards and state-of-the-art
burglary alarm systems.
More than 480 million roubles have been allocated from the state
budget in the past four years to upgrade security systems at cultural
facilities, said head of the interior ministry's state property protection
department Sergei Filippov.
"Last year alone, interdepartmental commission members conducted more
than 26,000 checks of security systems at cultural facilities and exposed
13,000 violations, 7,000 of which have already been corrected," he said.
However, he said, some regions are faced with certain difficulties
when cultural facilities maintenance is within the competence of municipal
authorities. "Heads of such institutions often do not have enough finds to
buy state-of-the-art burglary alarm systems and install cheap, inefficient
equipment instead," Filippov noted.
-0-ras