WASHINGTON — ICE’s Homeland Security Investigations and its partners repatriated 26 ancient artifacts seized by U.S. law enforcement officials to the Hellenic Republic of Greece during a ceremony at the Embassy of Greece in Washington D.C. April 23.
The artifacts were recovered through investigations conducted by HSI in collaboration with U.S. Customs and Border Protection, the FBI and the State Department.
The artifacts include 25 ancient coins dating as far back as the ancient Greek, Roman and Byzantine periods, and a 500-pound marble torso of Asclepius, the Greek god of medicine and healing.
The return of these stolen artifacts continues a long tradition of commitment to the protection of Greek cultural heritage. Since 2007, HSI has repatriated more than 200 objects of cultural heritage to Greece, many of which were seized under the bilateral cultural property agreement between the United States and Greece implemented in 2011.
A gold coin of Lampasakos, Mysia, minted in 370 B.C.E., depicts Hercules on the front and Pegasus on the reverse. The gold coin was excavated by an unknown looter and later sold to a middleman, who subsequently sold it to the head of a criminal organization for €7,000. It was illegally exported out of Greece and into Germany, where it failed to sell at an auction house before being sent to a U.S. auction house in Philadelphia.
Protecting and preserving the world’s cultural heritage and knowledge of past civilizations is one of HSI’s Cultural Property, Art, and Antiquities program’s primary goals. CPAA conducts training and outreach, supports cultural property investigations, and enhances international relations by working with foreign governments and citizens to return their nations’ looted cultural heritage and stolen artwork.
Since 2007, the CPAA program has partnered with the U.S. Department of State’s Cultural Heritage Center and the Smithsonian Institution to train HSI special agents, members of the FBI, customs officers and prosecutors in current techniques while educating them on trends for conducting criminal investigations and properly handling cultural property. Since that time, CPAA has repatriated over 25,000 objects to more than 40 countries worldwide.
Source: U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) / ICE Homeland Security Investigations
