Labor leader Keir Starmer is expected to tell Kyriakos Mitsotakis, who he will meet next week in London, that he will not block a mutually acceptable deal that would see part of the Parthenon Sculptures loaned to Athens, Financial reports Times.

Starmer, who hopes to become UK prime minister next year, will tell Mitsotakis that he would not stand in the way of a mutually acceptable deal between Athens and the British Museum over the future of the Sculptures.

Mitsotakis, reports the British media, will raise the issue of the Sculptors during his visit to London next week. On Tuesday, he will meet Starmer and Prime Minister Rishi Sounak in Downing Street and, according to a person close to the Greek prime minister, will raise the issue at both meetings.

Although Greek officials say they do not expect immediate results from the visit, Mitsotakis has been in talks with British Museum president George Osborne for months on the matter, the FT notes.

Osborne proposed a loan agreement in which part of the Sculptures would be sent to the Acropolis Museum in Athens in return for Greek treasures being sent to the Bloomsbury Museum in central London. Over time, various parts of the Parthenon Sculptures would be exhibited in Greece.

“I hope we can find a way to work with Greece so that some of the Marbles spend part of their time in Athens… and we see more of their treasures in return,” Osborne wrote in the Spectator last week. “We might not make it, but it’s definitely worth it.”

However, Kyriakos Mitsotakis claims the repatriation and reunification of all the Sculptures, so that the entire monument can be exhibited in the Acropolis Museum.

Starmer, whose Holborn & St Pancras constituency includes the British Museum, will tell the Greek prime minister that an incoming Labor government will not change the law on the Sculptures.

A 1963 law prevents the British Museum from returning the Sculptures. Sunak’s government has said it will not change the law.

However, associates of Starmer say he is prepared to be flexible. “We stick to the existing law, but if there is a loan agreement that is mutually acceptable to the British Museum and the Greek government, we will not stand in the way,” said a source close to Starmer.

The Labor leader’s office declined to comment ahead of the Greek prime minister’s visit. A Greek official said that “although the Greek government is not yet close to an agreement, this does not mean that we will not continue to raise the issue.”

According to Osborne’s plan, Greece will not renounce its claim to the Sculptures – it would be difficult for K. Mitsotakis to accept a “loan” of what he considers to be Greek property. But the British Museum would agree to send a third or more of the Sculptures to Athens for a specified period of time, such as 10 years.

Sunak hasn’t closed the door on such an arrangement, but he’s also bound by the law that prevents the Sculptors from ever returning. His associates say he is “skeptical” they would ever return if they were “loaned” to Athens.

“There was a bit of skepticism when George Osborne floated this idea earlier this year. We want the Sculptures to remain in Britain and there is a law.”

Lord David Cameron, the former UK prime minister and current foreign secretary, is a close friend of Osborne’s but said during his tenure in Downing Street that he had no intention of allowing Britain to lose “its Sculptures”.

A UK Government spokesperson said: “The UK has been caring for Marbles for generations. Our galleries and museums are funded by taxpayers because they are a huge asset to this country. We share their treasures with the world and people come to the UK to see them. The British Museum’s collection is protected by law and we have no intention of changing it.”