Greece urges Britain to return its Parthenon sculptures

On Friday, Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis called for talks with Britain to return the Parthenon sculptures to Athens that are currently kept at the British Museum.

As part of his response to Greece’s permanent request to return the 2,500-year-old sculptures, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said in March that Britain is the legitimate owner of the Parthenon marbles.

‘The United Kingdom should engage in genuine dialogue with Greece, and I urge them to do so,’ Mitsotakis said in a speech in Paris.

Mitsotakis, speaking at an event commemorating the 75th anniversary of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, UNESCO, said the organisation had taken a pivotal step in September when it recognised the issue had an intergovernmental character.
‘As a result, the obligation to return the Parthenon sculptures falls squarely on the UK government,’ he explained.

Since its independence in 1832, Greece has repeatedly demanded the return of the sculptures known in Britain as the Elgin Marbles, which were removed from the Parthenon temple in Athens by British diplomat Lord Elgin in the early nineteenth century, when Greece was under Ottoman rule.

The British Museum in London has refused to return the sculptures, which comprised roughly half of a 160-metre frieze that adorned the 5th century BC monument, claiming Elgin acquired them under a legal contract with the Ottoman Empire. They ‘are part of everyone’s shared heritage,’ it says.

‘As a result, the obligation to return the Parthenon sculptures falls squarely on the UK government,’ he explained.

Greece has repeatedly called for the return of those sculptures, known in Britain as the Elgin Marbles, that Lord Elgin, a British diplomat removed from the Parthenon temple in Athens, when Greece was still under Ottoman rule, since its independence in 1832.

Elgin obtained the sculptures as part of a legal contract with the Ottoman Empire and the British Museum in London refuses to return them, saying they were acquired by Elgin under that agreement.