Washington: The United States returned two batches of 64 Chinese cultural relics, artworks and paleontological fossils on Wednesday and Thursday, including a Bodhisattva statue from the Tianlongshan Grottoes in north China's Shanxi Province that was looted and lost overseas over a century ago.
According to the Chinese embassy in Washington, DC, the returned relics were delivered through the Cultural Property, Art and Antiquities Program of US Homeland Security Investigations.
Chinese Ambassador to the US Xie Feng said that the return represents years of close collaboration between Chinese and U.S. heritage authorities. Other returned items, including pottery figurines, stone sculptures and fossils, have significant historical, cultural and scientific value.
Xie said that the handover was both a major outcome of win-win cooperation between China and the U.S. and a milestone in cultural heritage protection.
China and the United States signed an intergovernmental memorandum of understanding on preventing the illegal import of Chinese cultural relics into the US in 2009. The memorandum has since been renewed in 2014, 2019 and 2024. The two sides have actively carried out repatriation cooperation, facilitating the return of cultural relics.