17.000 antiquities returned to Iraq

Relics‌‌ 11:27 PM - 2021-07-29

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On Thursday, The Minister of Culture, Tourism and Antiquities Hassan Nazim announced the arrival of 17,000 antiquities from the United States.

 

Nazim announced in a conference: "The antiquities that arrived on July 29th are sun-dried clay, and we returned them to their homeland."

 

"The antiquities were recovered, as a result, of the efforts of Ministries of Foreign Affairs and Culture represented by the Antiquities and Heritage Authority, and a great effort from the Iraqi Embassy in Washington," he added.

 

Additionally, Laith Hussein, the head of the Antiquities and Heritage Authority, confirmed that most of the recovered antiquities return to the period of Ur III dynasty 2121-2004 BC, from the modern Sumerian era.

 

On April 10th, 2003, the first looters broke into the National Museum of Iraq. Staff had vacated two days earlier, ahead of the advance of US forces on Baghdad. The museum was effectively ransacked for the next 36 hours until employees returned.

 

While the staff - showing enormous bravery and foresight - had removed and safely stored 8,366 artifacts before the looting, some 15,000 objects, were stolen during that 36 hours. While 7,000 items have been retrieved, more than 8,000 remain unaccounted for, including artifacts thousands of years old from some of the earliest sites in the Middle East. read more

 

 

 

PUKmedia