Arizona’s Hopi tribe faces off against Paris auction house

France 24

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70 sacred masks belonging to the American Indian Hopi tribe are set to be auctioned off on Friday, April 12, at the elegant Hotel Drouot in Paris.

But the Arizona-based tribe is protesting the foreign sale, and a Parisian court is expected to decide midday on Friday -- just before the auction is set to begin -- whether or not to suspend the event.

Survival International, a London-based association that defends tribal populations, has taken up the Hopi cause, filing the court action in France.

“It’s very odd that there are 70 masks that end up in the hands of a collector,” Pierre Servan-Schreiber, the French lawyer representing the association, says.

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