Athens/London (dpa) – Commentators said that the scandal of the return of art treasures from the British Museum to Greece could harm British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak. Media in both countries described Sunak’s last-minute cancellation of a meeting with fellow Greek Kyriakos Mitsotakis as “embarrassing”, “childish” and “unprofessional”.
“It was an unfortunate event,” Mitsotakis said Wednesday. But: “This made Greece’s just demand for the reunification of the Parthenon sculptures better known not only in the UK, but also in world public opinion.”
Other Greek politicians were much angrier. The British newspaper The Times quoted Foreign Minister Giorgos Gerapetritis as saying that canceling the invitation was outrageous. “It’s a massive diplomatic lack of tact. Even Israel and Hamas communicate.” Economy Minister Adonis Georgiadis commented that the demand to return the art treasures was “the opinion of eleven million Greeks and many millions of people around the world.”
For his part, he targeted British Prime Minister Mitsotakis. “It was clear that the purpose of the meeting was not to discuss the fundamental issues of the future, but to differentiate and renegotiate the problems of the past,” Sunak said in Parliament in London. Opposition Leader Keir Starmer accused the Prime Minister of wanting to humiliate the Greek Prime Minister.
The Prime Minister is upset
Sunak canceled a meeting scheduled to take place with Mitsotakis on Tuesday at short notice. The Prime Minister was apparently upset by a BBC interview in which the Greek again called on London to return the friezes of the Parthenon to the Acropolis. Mitsotakis says it’s like splitting up the Mona Lisa and displaying half of it in the Louvre in Paris and the other half in the British Museum.
Downing Street defended the cancellation by saying that during the interview, Mitsotakis violated an agreement not to address the issue publicly. But Sunak has also been criticized within his Conservative Party. Foreign Affairs Committee Chair Alicia Cairns said this approach was difficult to understand.
The dispute over ownership of antiquities has been going on for decades. The Parthenon (“Chamber of the Virgin”) is one of the most famous surviving architectural monuments of ancient Greece. At the beginning of the 19th century, the British diplomat Lord Elgin dismantled the best preserved marble panels and sculptures from the Parthenon frieze and brought them to England. There he sold it to the British Museum in 1816. Athena talks about the theft.
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