Italian authorities suspect that some Roman antiquities in Japanese museums may have been looted, a news report said yesterday amid efforts by Italy to recover relics of its rich past it says were smuggled out of the country.
The Italian government plans to put together a catalog of about 100 ancient treasures and ask the Japanese Cultural Affairs Agency to cooperate in recovering them, Japan's largest daily Yomiuri Shimbun reported from Rome, citing unnamed Italian prosecutors.
About 50 of the 100 allegedly smuggled items currently reside in the Miho Museum, a private museum in Shiga, western Japan, that is renowned for its collection of antique art, Yomiuri said. The antiquities in question at Miho include a sculpture and fresco painting from ancient Rome.
The report did not say when the suspected items were taken to Japan.
Japanese officials, however, said yesterday they had not been contacted by Italian authorities and had no idea whether any of the Roman artifacts in Japanese museums had been looted.
Suspected
Hiroaki Katayama, the head of Miho's cultural department, said the museum does not know which items are suspected of having been looted, adding that the number of items believed to be from the Roman period is less than 50.
"We believe our collection does not include anything that was dug up illegally. We don't know what kind of proof they have. We would like to know the details [of the allegations] as soon as possible," Katayama said.
Cultural Affairs Agency official Rio Higuchi said officials did not know if any looted antiquities had been smuggled into Japan.
Italy has been cracking down on antiquities trafficking and campaigning to recover artifacts it contends were stolen or illegally exported from the country and sold to European and US museums.
New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art, Boston's Museum of Fine Arts and Los Angeles' J. Paul Getty Museum have agreed to return antiquities.
Incumbent Ecuadoran President Daniel Noboa on Sunday claimed a runaway victory in the nation’s presidential election, after voters endorsed the young leader’s “iron fist” approach to rampant cartel violence. With more than 90 percent of the votes counted, the National Election Council said Noboa had an unassailable 12-point lead over his leftist rival Luisa Gonzalez. Official results showed Noboa with 56 percent of the vote, against Gonzalez’s 44 percent — a far bigger winning margin than expected after a virtual tie in the first round. Speaking to jubilant supporters in his hometown of Olon, the 37-year-old president claimed a “historic victory.” “A huge hug
Two Belgian teenagers on Tuesday were charged with wildlife piracy after they were found with thousands of ants packed in test tubes in what Kenyan authorities said was part of a trend in trafficking smaller and lesser-known species. Lornoy David and Seppe Lodewijckx, two 19-year-olds who were arrested on April 5 with 5,000 ants at a guest house, appeared distraught during their appearance before a magistrate in Nairobi and were comforted in the courtroom by relatives. They told the magistrate that they were collecting the ants for fun and did not know that it was illegal. In a separate criminal case, Kenyan Dennis
A judge in Bangladesh issued an arrest warrant for the British member of parliament and former British economic secretary to the treasury Tulip Siddiq, who is a niece of former Bangladeshi prime minister Sheikh Hasina, who was ousted in August last year in a mass uprising that ended her 15-year rule. The Bangladeshi Anti-Corruption Commission has been investigating allegations against Siddiq that she and her family members, including Hasina, illegally received land in a state-owned township project near Dhaka, the capital. Senior Special Judge of Dhaka Metropolitan Zakir Hossain passed the order on Sunday, after considering charges in three separate cases filed
APPORTIONING BLAME: The US president said that there were ‘millions of people dead because of three people’ — Vladimir Putin, Joe Biden and Volodymyr Zelenskiy US President Donald Trump on Monday resumed his attempts to blame Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy for Russia’s invasion, falsely accusing him of responsibility for “millions” of deaths. Trump — who had a blazing public row in the Oval Office with Zelenskiy six weeks ago — said the Ukranian shared the blame with Russian President Vladimir Putin, who ordered the February 2022 invasion, and then-US president Joe Biden. Trump told reporters that there were “millions of people dead because of three people.” “Let’s say Putin No. 1, but let’s say Biden, who had no idea what the hell he was doing, No. 2, and
RSS