PHNOM PENH, May 11 (Xinhua) -- Two U.S. auction houses and a museum had agreed to return three stolen ancient sandstone statues to Cambodia, a senior Cambodian official said Sunday.
The official also said that the artifacts would be repatriated to the country early next month.
Cambodian Deputy Prime Minister and Cabinet Minister Sok An said the New York-based Sotheby's had returned the 10th century statue of a Hindu warrior Duryodhana, Christie's had agreed to return the 10th-century sandstone depiction of a mythological figure known as Pandava, and the Norton Simon Museum in California had decided to give the 10th century statue of warrior Bhima back to Cambodia.
"The three statues will be arriving in Cambodia simultaneously in early June," he told reporters at Phnom Penh International Airport upon his arrival from New York, where he received the statue from Sotheby's. "This is a success for Cambodia," he said.
The three statues were stolen in the 1970s in the Prasat Chen monument of Koh Ker temple complex, a remote archaeological site in northern Cambodia, which had been the target of widespread looting during Cambodia's two-decade civil war, which began in the late 1960s.
In June last year, the Metropolitan Museum of Art (Met) in New York voluntarily returned two 10th century stone statues of " Kneeling Attendants" to Cambodia after nearly 20 years on public display in the Met. The two statues were illicitly removed from the same temple at the time of Cambodia's civil war in the 1970s.
Cambodia on Thursday thanked the United States for its commitment to preserving cultural heritage of humanities and its strong willingness to promote the friendship and cooperation between the two countries.
It also appealed to other museums and art collectors around the world to follow the example of returning plundered treasures to their rightful owners as part of the worldwide campaign for the protection of cultural heritage.
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