1.Member States shall provide in their legislation that return proceedings under this Directive may not be brought more than three years after the competent central authority of the requesting Member State became aware of the location of the cultural object and of the identity of its possessor or holder.
Such proceedings may, in any event, not be brought more than 30 years after the object was unlawfully removed from the territory of the requesting Member State.
However, in the case of objects forming part of public collections, defined in point (8) of Article 2, and objects belonging to inventories of ecclesiastical or other religious institutions in the Member States where they are subject to special protection arrangements under national law, return proceedings shall be subject to a time-limit of 75 years, except in Member States where proceedings are not subject to a time-limit or in the case of bilateral agreements between Member States providing for a period exceeding 75 years.
2.Return proceedings may not be brought if removal of the cultural object from the national territory of the requesting Member State is no longer unlawful at the time when they are to be initiated.