Philippines loses Marcos paintings

President Marcos was toppled from power in 1986

Art treasures seized from the family of former Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos have gone missing in the United States, a government agency has admitted.

Among the missing paintings are works by the French artists Claude Monet and Edgar Degas and Swiss painter Paul Klee.

We don't even know how these paintings were lost

Government agency spokeswoman

Many of the pictures had been stored in a Philippine Government-owned building in New York.

Investigators are trying to establish how many pictures have gone and who took them.

As many as 20 paintings could be missing - just some of the assets seized when Ferdinand Marcos fell from power in 1986.

"We don't have a record on how much they're actually worth," said Haydee Yorac, chairwoman of the Presidential Commission on Good Government (PCGG).

"The thing is, we don't even know how these paintings were lost and we don't know who the persons under whose responsibility these paintings were when they were lost."

Missing money

But she said someone would have to take the blame.

"If there are persons who are legally responsible for the loss, then we will take steps to make them respond to the failure of responsibility," she said. "There must have been someone there.

"You just don't leave these paintings lying around."

One painting held by Marcos - Head of a Woman, by Spanish surrealist Pablo Picasso - was recovered in 1998 when somebody tried to sell it in New York, Ms Yorac said.

Ms Yorac said the auditor of the PCGG, which is in charge of recovering the ill-gotten gains of the Marcos family, had also informed the commission of an apparent financial "discrepancy" of $375,000 (20 million pesos).

She said she was waiting for an explanation from the finance department, but said it could be a simple accounting error.