Statue of Athena from Acropolis Museum to be exhibited in Palermo for the next four years

A 4th century B.C. statue of Athena from the Acropolis Museum in Athens was delivered to the Antonino Salinas Regional Archaeological Museum in Palermo, Sicily during a ceremony, Greece’s Culture Ministry announced.

Culture and Sports Minister Lina Mendoni noted that the statue will remain on display in Sicily for four years, as a token of appreciation for the return of the Fagan fragment from the Parthenon frieze to the Acropolis Museum for eight years, ANA-MPA reported. Greece and Italy are currently negotiating the permanent return of the Frieze to its rightful home, an initiative that Greece hopes will indicate the path that London can follow with the return of the Parthenon Marbles.

“It is a great joy and honour for me to be with you, together with the general director of the Acropolis Museum and my associates, in order to return the generosity contained in the initiative by the regional government of Sicily…to not only give the Fagan fragment from the Parthenon frieze for lengthy exhibition in the Acropolis Museum but also to ask the Italian culture ministry for its permanent repatriation in Athens,” she said extending Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis’ regards.

“The return and reunification of the Parthenon Sculptures in Athens is a moral obligation for all of Europe, in the context of protecting our common cultural heritage. And the greatest strength for their reunification is the faith of the European themselves, as that of British citizens, in the importance of the Parthenon, this supreme monument for European culture,” the minister noted, stressing that Greece views the architectural Parthenon sculptures at the British Museum as the proceeds of theft.

“Greece does not recognise any right of ownership, possession and exploitation of these. On the contrary, it is constitutionally obliged and morally justified in demanding and striving for their final, permanent and irrevocable return by any legal and available means, in order to restore justice and the moral order and chiefly to restore the integrity of the monument,” Mendoni concluded.

Neoskosmos.com