Mendoni: The definitive return of the Parthenon Sculptures is difficult but not impossible

“Achieving an agreement for the definitive return of the Parthenon Sculptures is difficult but not impossible. It is necessary to define principles and framework, to be aware of the red line and to stick to the national goal.

This was emphasized by the Minister of Culture, Lina Mendoni, in the Parliament, in response to a relevant topical question by KINAL-PASOK MP Dimitris Konstantopoulos, who underlined that “the Greek government must proceed with complete transparency and prudence in this crucial national cultural issue in which no there is no place for petty political crowns, scruples and expediencies, nor instrumentalization of it, but everyone must stand up to the circumstances imposed by the historical juncture”.

“Our position was and remains national, unanimous, like-minded, unchanging and clear. We do not recognize any right of ownership and possession over the Sculptures in the British Museum as they are the product of theft. Nothing has changed from our position.

“Greece is constitutionally obliged and morally legitimized to demand and pursue by any legal and appropriate means the definitive, permanent and irrevocable return of the Parthenon Sculptures in order to redress the law and moral order and above all to restore the integrity of the monument,” the minister pointed out Culture and added:

“From the beginning, the government has been working systematically, responsibly, effectively, to achieve the national goal, that is, the return and reunification of the Parthenon Sculptures in Athens and the Acropolis Museum.

The government has a strategy. Strategic negotiation that is made public ceases to be strategy. We utilize every means. We use dialogue and cultural diplomacy.

The systematic informing of the international scientific community about the legitimacy of our demand for the demolition of the British positions – and most of the arguments of the United Kingdom have anyway been demolished with honesty, clarity and strong argumentation. The British Museum is no exception.”

Afterwards, Mrs. Mendoni spoke of “clear and tangible results of the government’s policy”, noting that “the violent detachment of the Sculptors and their removal from their natural environment and their ideological content goes against the current laws, the public right feeling while it is contrary to national and international law, international agreements and conventions and generally accepted principles for the protection and management of cultural heritage”.

He also rejected Mr. Konstantopoulos’ accusations that “the government is trying to instrumentalize the issue of the return of the Marbles in view of the elections”, arguing that “the prime minister himself disentangled the issue from the electoral process”.

“He was the first to raise the issue seriously and officially with his British counterpart, Boris Johnson.

The fact that the British Minister of Culture intervened to cut off the debate created by the British Museum automatically shows the intergovernmental dimension of the issue. Whether they want it or not, they recognized it in this way”, emphasized the Minister of Culture and continued:

“In any case, the return of the Sculptors and the reunification is a national issue. Because the Parthenon Sculptures are organic and integral members of a complex architecture and an artistic creation. They are not statues, they are not sculptural compositions that were autonomous in space.

They are members of the monument itself. And the monument itself, the Haskek and mutilated monument, the Parthenon demands the return of its architectural sculptural members in order to acquire its single and indivisible physical aesthetic and semantic entity.

There is no point in saying what the Parthenon means to Western Civilization. It makes no sense to say why it is the greatest monument of Western Civilization.

What we must maintain is that the international community, as there is now an international climate which demands the return of stolen cultural goods to their countries of origin, this international community demands that this masterpiece of art be reunited in its entirety in Athens and in the Acropolis Museum”.

“The repatriation and reunification of the Parthenon Sculptures is a national issue. And obviously it is a universal requirement but it is also a moral obligation for all of Europe in the context of the protection of the common cultural heritage”, concluded Mrs. Mendoni.

RES-EMP

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