One of the news of recent days has been the relocation of the Smithsonian Museum to Washington. He announced the return of 29 items from the Treasures of Benin to Nigeria. Ownership of the objects was transferred to the National Committee of Museums. Nigeria and so the leaders of the Smithsonian Institution can take pride in having done the right thing from a moral standpoint. The same can be said of the universities of Oxford and Cambridge, Germany and France. Unfortunately, however, this is not the case for many British museums.

“The debate has moved on, times have changed,” British MP and former Culture Minister Ed Vesey, among others, said during a House of Lords debate yesterday. The subject of the debate, which was conducted in an extremely civilized, even humorous form, was a proposal to revise the British law, which, in simple terms, prohibits British museums from returning antiquities to their country of origin, whether it is called Nigeria, or Greece. Reminds you of something;

Yes, that’s right, most minds will go straight to the British Museum and their reunion. Sculptors of the Parthenon, and it is this MP who wants to play an active role in this. Things, of course, as was said yesterday afternoon, are quite complicated.

The British government appears unwilling to discuss any changes to this legislation, which turns 40 in 2023. Let’s also not forget that the British Museum is “fortified” by another old law in 1963, which prohibits the export of parts of its collection. While British public opinion seems to support the return of the antiquities on moral grounds, the government seems to be oblivious to this. The new prime minister, Liz Truss, does not seem willing to open the issue of the Parthenon sculptures. At least for now.

“Ethical reasons”, however vague they may sound, are of no small importance. In fact, a new legislative framework is in the works (the Charities Act 2022) that will come into effect this winter and will allow all UK museums to return antiques on ethical grounds under certain conditions. We hope that this feature will remain in place when the law comes into force. On the positive side of the Greek case, the Sculptors are still in the world news and there is a growing demand for their return to the core of morality. Ed Vesey is also the president of the Parthenon Project initiative since yesterday, which is acquiring a board of directors with the likes of actor Stephen Fry, journalist Sarah Baxter, and others.

The goal is for the British government to sit down at the negotiating table, as requested by UNESCO. At this table, we know what we want to receive, but what we are going to give was not known.