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Hun Sen Appeals to Protect Cambodian Cultural Property
Prime Minister Hun Sen Tuesday urged the nation to protect Cambodia's cultural properties.
He made the appeal at the opening meeting of the 11th session of the UNESCO Intergovernmental Committee for promoting the return of cultural property to their countries of origin or their restitution in case of illicit appropriation. The meeting will last till March 9.
This is the first time that the UNESCO Intergovernmental Committee holds such a meeting in Asia.
Hun Sen pointed out that, in Cambodia, lack of a legal framework and appropriate means, including fund, material and human resources, have made it difficult to prevent the outflows of the works of arts and cultural assets from the country.
He appealed to all parties concerned, including international organizations, institutions, museums, traders in artifacts, countries involving in the trafficking of cultural masterpieces and artifacts to work closely and make concerted efforts to establish a legal framework governing rigorously the imports, exports and the markets of artifacts.
The Cambodian authorities have taken necessary measures to provide protection of cultural assets, especially the promulgation of the Law on Protection of Cultural Heritage in 1996, the premier added.
He stated that Cambodia has signed bilateral and multilateral agreements with many neighboring countries with a view to strengthening cooperation in this area, so it has so far recovered a number of stolen or illegally exported cultural assets, such as Shiva bust returned from the New York Museum and a sandstone sculpture from Switzerland, and 117 pieces of artifacts from Thailand.html target=_blank>Thailand.
The premier called on international organizations and friendly countries to give continued assistance to Cambodia in institutional capacity building in order to better protect its cultural heritage.
In 1972, Cambodia became a member to the 1970 UNESCO Convention on the Measures to Ban Exports and Imports and the Transfer of Ownership of Illegally Acquired Cultural Assets.
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