Phnom PenhAP —
The return to Cambodia this week of 14 sculptures looted from the country during a period of war and unrest is like welcoming home the souls of ancestors, Cambodia’s culture minister, Phoeurng Sackona, said Thursday.
The items repatriated from New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art arrived Wednesday and were displayed to journalists and VIPs on Thursday at the National Museum in the Cambodian capital, Phnom Penh.
They “were made between the 9th and 14th centuries in the Angkorian period and reflect the Hindu and Buddhist religious systems prevailing at that time,” the museum said in a statement.
A statement from Cambodia’s Ministry of Culture and Fine Arts said the “historic homecoming of national treasures” followed several years of negotiations between Cambodia’s art restitution team, United States federal prosecutors in New York, investigators from the US Department of Homeland Security and the Metropolitan Museum.