> This is not about Spanish law, but international maritime law. This is about your original assertion that "they didn’t steal anything." And the answer to tha

> This is not about Spanish law, but international maritime law. This is about your original assertion that "they didn’t steal anything." And the answer to that depends on whatever the law was in the place where the supposed theft occurred. Spain would presumably take the position that this would be Spanish territorial law. But that merely begs the question, since the whole issue is whether Spanish colonial rule was legitimate. > This is a bit anarchistic. That's a bit ironic. One might say that it was Spain's colonization that was anarchistic, since it was done in obvious disregard of the laws and customs of the people living on that land at the time. Maybe today they are just dealing with the consequences. In any case, I would imagine that the matter would be resolved by some sort of tribunal with competent jurisdiction. If they were to conclude that Spain's claim to the treasure were illegitimate because it was ill-gotten, that's hardly anarchism. Of course, I'm not predicting that this will actually occur. In fact, I'm not sure I'm prepared to argue that it should occur. I'm merely pointing out that, if the assertion is "the Spanish stole," then arguing that they didn't, because the Spanish had colonized the country and claimed it as their territory, isn't very helpful, and perhaps missing the point. The person who thinks "the Spanish stole" would clearly also consider these unilateral Spanish proclamations to be illegitimate--and it's not obvious to me why they would be wrong. > any_ country may be free from following international treaties and laws An exaggeration, surely. The argument I'm making is specific to situations where today's legal rights directly depend on the legitimacy of historical territorial claims.