[CPProt.net] U.S. Returns 3 Stolen Artifacts to Iraq

[museum-security (FTP)]

U.S. Returns 3 Stolen Artifacts to Iraq


By TOM HAYS
Associated Press Writer

January 18, 2005, 6:55 PM EST


NEW YORK -- Three thimble-size artifacts looted from a Baghdad museum and
sold on the black market for $200 to a scholar-turned-smuggler were
returned Tuesday to the Iraqi government.

Department of Homeland Security Assistant Secretary Michael Garcia turned
over the Mesopotamian stone seals to Iraq's U.N. Ambassador Samir
al-Sumaidaie at a news conference in Manhattan.

The relics, used to seal correspondence, date to 2340-2180 B.C., the
ambassador said.

"They are completely priceless," he said. "They are part of our history."

Nearly 15,000 items were swiped from the Iraqi National Museum after the
U.S. invasion began, al-Sumaidaie said. Roughly half of those items have
been located, sometimes with the help of a special team of federal agents
dispatched to Iraq.

An agent at Kennedy Airport in New York spotted the items in June 2003
during a routine search of a suitcase belonging to a scholar who had
arrived from London.

Joseph Braude had not declared the seals, which were adorned with human
and animal figures and marked on the bottom with the letters "IM," for
"Iraq museum." Braude, the author of the 2003 book "The New Iraq:
Rebuilding the Country for its People, the Middle East and the World,"
insisted he had traveled to Kuwait and England but not Iraq.

He eventually admitted buying the ancient pieces of art for $200 during a
visit to Baghdad, authorities said. He also acknowledged knowing that the
seals were likely stolen from the museum.

Last year, Braude pleaded guilty to federal charges of smuggling and
making false statements and was sentenced to two years probation.

http://www.newsday.com/entertainment/news/wire/sns-ap-iraqi-artifacts,0,18912.story?coll=sns-ap-entertainment-headlines