“Reaching an agreement on the final return Sculptors of the Parthenon it’s difficult, but not impossible. It is necessary to define principles and frameworks, to be aware of the red line and to stick to the national goal. This was emphasized by Minister of Culture Lina Mendoni in Parliament, answering a topical question from KIN.ALL.-PASOK MP Dimitris Konstantinopoulos, who stressed that “the Greek government must act with full transparency and discretion in this most important national and cultural issue, in which there is no place for any petty political crowns, suspicions and expediencies, nor its instrumentalization, and everyone must confront the circumstances imposed by the historical moment.

“Our position was and remains national, unanimous, unanimous, unchanged and clear. We do not recognize ownership or ownership of sculptures in the British Museum as they are the result of theft. Nothing has changed from our position.

“Greece is constitutionally bound and morally mandated to demand and seek by any legal and appropriate means the final, permanent and irrevocable return of the Parthenon sculptures, in order to rectify the law and moral order and, above all, to restore the integrity of the monument.” The Minister of Culture noted and added:

“From the very beginning, the government has worked systematically, responsibly and effectively to achieve the national goal, that is, the return and reunification of the sculptures of the Parthenon in Athens and the Acropolis Museum. The government has a strategy. Strategic negotiations that are made public cease to be a strategy. We use all means. We use dialogue and cultural diplomacy. Systematically informing the international scientific community about the legitimacy of our demand to challenge the British position – and somehow most of the British arguments were refuted with honesty, clarity and strong argument. The British Museum is no exception.”

Thereafter, Ms. Mendoni spoke of “clear and tangible results of the government’s policies”, noting that “the forcible removal of the Sculptors and their removal from their natural environment and their conceptual content goes against the laws in force, the public about righteous feelings, but also the mores of the era in which it took place. In addition, today it is contrary to national and international legislation, international agreements and conventions, generally accepted principles of protection and management of cultural heritage.”

He also dismissed Mr. Constantinopoulos’ allegations that “the government is trying to instrumentalize the issue of the return of the Marbles in connection with the elections”, arguing that “the prime minister himself has separated this issue from the electoral process.” “He was the first to seriously and formally raise this issue with his British counterpart Boris Johnson. That the British Minister of Culture intervened to end the debate that the British Museum was unleashing automatically shows the intergovernmental dimension of the problem. Whether they want it or not, they recognized it as such,” the Minister of Culture emphasized and continued:

“In any case, the return of the Sculptors and reunification is a national issue. Because the sculptures of the Parthenon are organic and integral elements of complex architecture and artistic creativity. These are not statues, these are not spatially autonomous sculptural compositions. They are members of the monument itself. And the monument itself, the Basque and mutilated monument, the Parthenon, requires the return of its architectural and sculptural members in order to find its single and indivisible physical aesthetic and semantic unity. It makes no sense to say what the Parthenon means for Western civilization. It makes no sense to say why this is the greatest monument of Western civilization. What we must refrain from is that the international community, since there is currently an international climate demanding the return of stolen cultural property to their countries of origin, this international community is demanding that this masterpiece of art be fully reunited in Athens and the Acropolis Museum.” .

“The repatriation and reunification of the Parthenon sculptures is a national issue. And, obviously, this is a universal requirement, but it is also a moral obligation for the whole of Europe in the context of protecting the common cultural heritage,” L. Mendoni concluded.

^{Source: RES-IPE}