Cambodia Marks the Return of 70 Looted Artefacts from Overseas

Thursday marked a milestone event in which Cambodia celebrated the return of 70 stolen Khmer ancient artefacts back to the Southeast Asian nation from abroad.

According to Xinhua news agency, sourcing the Ministry of Culture and Fine Arts, lately, there have been 70 Khmer cultural objects repatriated to the kingdom through different processes inclusive of voluntary returns, negotiations, seizures, and legal proceedings.

This artefact was returned from various collections, which include those of the Lindemann family, Jim Clark, the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, and private collectors based in the United States.

Speaking at an event held in the Peace Palace, Phnom Penh, Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Manet said that the peace has given the country an enormous opportunity to return the souls of ancestors and precious treasures to their homeland.

"For hundreds of years, these cultural treasures, the legacy of our ancestors, had been away from their homeland due to war, theft, and illegal trade abroad," he said. "So those returned ancient artefacts are of 'priceless' value for Cambodian people, who are the rightful owners of those cultural treasures."

Hun Manet stated that between 1996 and today, Cambodia had reclaimed 1,098 plundered antiquities from countries that include the United States, France, Australia, Britain, Thailand, Japan, Indonesia, the Netherlands, Switzerland, Canada, Denmark, Germany, Hungary, and Norway.

The Cambodian Minister of Culture and Fine Arts, Phoeurng Sackona, claims this recent return of souls of these Khmer ancestors is a result of great efforts channeled into it by the government in cooperation with all relevant partners, including public institutions, the private sectors, national and international experts, and various countries.

According to her, some of the most important Hindu and Buddhist masterpieces of the pre-Angkor and Angkor periods, valuable stone statues, a mythical warrior of the Hindu epic Mahabharata, statues of Shiva and Uma, a statue of Ardhanarishvara from the ancient capital of Koh Ker, and a bronze head of Lokeshvara reunited with its body at the National Museum of Phnom Penh after being separated for decades due to war and illicit trafficking, were among the many returned Khmer cultural treasures.

"The Cambodian people are proud and joyful for the return of these national treasures representing our ancestral souls and identity under the umbrella of peace and development," she said.