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A prominent U.S. museum will return to Cambodia more than a dozen valuable artifacts that were looted and illegally trafficked into the institution’s collection, a prosecutor said Friday.
The artifacts were originally stolen by prolific antiquities dealer Douglas Latchford, who in 2019 was accused of running a large network that stole treasures from Southeast Asia.
The returned items include a priceless 10th-century sandstone statue of a goddess and a life-size 7th-century Buddha head.
Prosecutors said 13 Khmer artifacts would be returned, but the Met, where they are on display, said another 14 sculptures would go to Cambodia and two to Thailand.
“The Met has voluntarily agreed to return the artifacts, and they are currently in the process of being transferred,” said the office of Damian Williams, the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York.
The office said Latchford was accused of “orchestrating a multi-year scheme to sell stolen Cambodian antiquities on the international art market”.
That prosecution was later dropped due to Latchford’s death.
The Met said: “Following Latchford’s indictment, the Met proactively reached out to prosecutors and Cambodian officials, and through this partnership the museum received new information about the sculptures that made it clear that the works should be transferred.”
“Some of the sculptures – including the bronze masterpiece Seated and Reclining Avalokitesvara (late 10th-early 11th century) and a massive stone Buddha head (7th century) – will remain on display in the museum’s South Asian Art Gallery while arrangements are being made for their repatriation to their countries of origin.”
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The Met recently announced it would take steps to better respect cultural property, including a review of its inventory.
“These are very important artifacts so we ask for their return,” Cambodian Culture Ministry spokesman Hab Thaci told AFP ahead of Friday’s announcement. “They are all our ancient artifacts dating back to the Angkor era.”
“They are very fine objects, ancient objects, the spirits of our ancestors.”
The works that need to be returned were stolen in the late 20th century, during the Cambodian war in the 1970s, and during Cambodia’s reopening to the outside world in the 1990s.
For decades, thousands of statues and sculptures have been trafficked from Cambodia to antique dealers in Bangkok, Thailand, and then illegally exported to collectors, dealers and museums in Asia, Europe and the United States.
Officials say more than 1,000 artifacts valued at $225 million have been returned to more than 20 countries, including Cambodia, China, India, Egypt, Greece and Italy, over the past two years.
New York is a hub for antiquities trafficking, with multiple artifacts seized since 2021 from museums including the venerable Met and from wealthy private collectors in Manhattan.
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