Restitution Guidelines

As tasked expressly by the Terezin Declaration, the Institute has conducted intergovernmental negotiations on the topic of restitution or compensation of private and communal properties seized by the Nazis that have so far remained unrestituted or uncompensated.  

The negotiations culminated in Prague in June 2010, when an historically unprecedented document entitled Guidelines and Best Practices for the Restitution and Compensation of Immovable (Real) Property Confiscated or Otherwise Wrongfully Seized by the Nazis, Fascists and Their Collaborators during the Holocaust (Shoah) Era between 1933-1945, Including the Period of World War II was adopted by 43 countries and festively announced in the Lichtenstein Palace in the presence of the then serving Czech Prime Minister Jan Fischer, Israeli Minister for Senior Citizens Leah Ness, Special Advisor of the U.S. Secretary of State on Holocaust Issues Ambassador Stuart Eizenstat, and other notables.