The Ministry of Tourism and antiquities succeeded in recovering 16 Egyptian artefacts from the US in cooperation with the New York Attorney General’s Office, the Egyptian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and various concerned authorities in the country.
This comes within the framework of the highest priority given by the Egyptian state to recovering smuggled Egyptian antiquities and repatriating them to the homeland.
Shaaban Abdel Jawad — General Supervisor of the Recovered Antiquities Department at the Supreme Council of Antiquities — explained that the recovered pieces had been smuggled out of the country illegally, which was proved by investigations conducted in the US in three different cases.
He added that among the recovered items are six artefacts from the Metropolitan Museum that were confiscated by the US Attorney’s Office in Manhattan, New York, in a major case that included the smuggling of a number of artefacts to the US and France, where investigations are still ongoing.
Also among the recovered items are nine rare artefacts that were in the possession of an American businessman, which were proven to have been acquired illegally, in addition to a gold coin dating back to the Ptolemaic Era.
The pieces are scheduled to be delivered to the Egyptian Consulate-General in New York over the next few days in preparation for their prompt repatriation.
