September 12, 2024
PHNOM PENH – Cambodia recently celebrated the official handover of 70 artefacts returned from the US, including 14 from The Metropolitan Museum of Art (The Met) in New York, during a ceremony on August 22 at the Peace Palace. To date, the US government has facilitated the return of more than 150 antiquities to Cambodia.
It has been reported that The Met still holds a significant number of stolen Khmer treasures, “mostly” obtained from the notorious antiquities dealer Douglas Latchford. In recent years, Latchford’s family has announced the return of more than 100 artefacts to Cambodia from his personal collection.
Last week, the US State Department organised a tour to the US for Cambodian officials from the Ministry of Culture and Fine Arts, led by permanent secretary of state Hab Touch, to gain insights and experience in the conservation of historical objects. Touch told The Post on September 9 that Cambodia is in negotiations with The Met to secure the return of additional artefacts.
However, on September 3, an incident occurred when prominent lawyer and managing director of Edenbridge Asia, Bradley J. Gordon – who has been involved in nearly all negotiations for the return of stolen artefacts – was escorted out of a meeting room at The Met, leaving his Cambodian client behind. Gordon was only allowed to return the following day, September 4.
The Post’s Niem Chheng spoke with Gordon yesterday, September 10, about the incident and Cambodia’s position on reclaiming stolen items held abroad.
You were barred from accompanying your client at The Met. As one of the most important people involved in the negotiations for the return of Cambodian artefacts, what do you think about this?
I believe what The Met did was unethical. They should not be separating a client from their lawyer, especially as the Minister of Culture and Fine Arts requested me to be there as counsel. This is a basic rule.
From what I understand, The Met was offering gifts to Cambodia, such as fellowships and trips for senior ministry officials, but they still wanted to keep the stolen artefacts in New York. That’s not acceptable. I know they were nervous that if I was in the room, I might have objected to this. It’s unethical, and The Met used the excuse that it was a US State Department meeting to bar me.
The US State Department later apologised to me and said it wasn’t their decision to exclude me. So, The Met used the US State Department for their own purposes and that is not acceptable.
By law, is the return of stolen artefacts to their country of origin, like Cambodia, mandatory, or is it done on a voluntary basis?
There are laws against possessing stolen property and to protect cultural heritage and legal actions are being taken by the US government in some cases. I believe that due to media scrutiny and coverage, many collectors and museums want to do the right thing. So, they are contacting us on their own initiative or talking to US authorities, saying they will return the artefacts because they don’t want to go to court. They do not want to fight with the US government or have the media looking into what’s in their living rooms. Those cases are being described as voluntary returns, but there are laws, right? There are many laws that may have been broken concerning these statues.
Cambodia hasn’t issued any export permits that we’re aware of in for almost 100 years. So, in our view, without an export permit, all these statues are considered stolen unless they were given as a gift by the King, which is probably the only exception I can think of. Stolen property is still stolen property. Can you keep stolen property? The answer is no.
Is there any progress in the ongoing negotiations with The Met? Cambodia seems hopeful that more artefacts will be returned home.
I believe Cambodia will remain firm in its position. As I posted on LinkedIn, much of this issue stems from Douglas Latchford, who was one of the main players, with many of the collections originating from him. Latchford was indicted for trafficking stolen goods and I believe The Met knows it has a collection of “blood antiquities”.
The Met’s concern is that if they return items to Cambodia, other countries – like India, Indonesia and many others – will follow suit and make similar demands. A lot of these collections are connected to Latchford or one other famous dealer named Subhash Kapoor.
So right now, the entire Asian collection at The Met may be under question. The Met doesn’t want to face this. They want Cambodia to go away and their approach appears to be offering gifts to keep the statues at the museum.
They have a very colonial mindset, thinking they are the best custodians of these artefacts. I don’t believe they care about the spiritual significance or cultural value of these statues to the Cambodians. They just want to keep them, despite everyone knowing they were stolen.
The Met doesn’t want me in the room because they know I’m advocating for the Cambodian people. Instead, they tried to separate me from the negotiations, offering various gifts to Cambodia to keep it content while holding onto the stolen statues in New York. So, negotiations are ongoing, but we’ll see how the negotiations progress.
One of the 49 Khmer artefacts Cambodia is still negotiating with The Met to have returned. PHOTO: EDENBRIDGE ASIA/THE PHNOM PENH POST
They asked me to collect my bag and leave the room, and even had a guard escort me out of the building, leaving my client and the Cambodian delegation behind. This is unethical – just terrible and extremely upsetting. The next day they invited me back and I went in again to view the collection. There are so many important statues there. We’ve asked for 49 additional artefacts to be returned after The Met gave back the 14 artefacts. Right now, we’re negotiating for the return of the 49 artefacts that are of priority.
We’re also facing an issue with provenance documents. They don’t want to show us the information they have on the Cambodian statues and are delaying the process. I believe The Met is stalling because of the statute of limitations in New York. If they delay long enough, they might believe we won’t be able to bring a legal case against them. So, their game is to delay and offer other things, like training and fellowships, to keep control of these valuable artefacts.
The negotiation process is very important, especially given the loss of the statue known as Golden Boy, which was returned to Thailand. I believe Cambodia tried to advocate for its return. Could you elaborate on why The Met gave it to Thailand?
Yes, I believe that decision shocked many people who are knowledgeable about antiquities. The question is: What exactly is The Met doing? Why did they decide to return those two statues to Thailand at the same time they returned 14 artefacts to Cambodia? And why did they do this without consulting us? There was absolutely no consultation.
We asked The Met again the other day, and I personally questioned them about the reasoning and the proof they have that those two statues are from Thailand. They refused to tell me. We’ve made it clear that we are not happy with how they handled that decision. The Met should have at least consulted with us or provided an explanation for why they made that choice. The Met are still refusing to do so.
It seems The Met made that decision on purpose. So the question is: why?
When an artefact is claimed by multiple parties, there should be a process to deliberate. What’s remarkable is the “Kneeling Queen”. For decades, The Met has repeatedly said that it is the most beautiful bronze from Cambodia, outside of Cambodia. So why did they give it back to Thailand? If it was truly found in Thailand, under international law, we would accept that and not argue. Who exactly found it in Thailand? We have not seen conclusive evidence of that, and we are still conducting our research. Given The Met’s behaviour, the way The Met handled this is unacceptable.
It has been reported that The Met still holds a significant number of stolen Khmer treasures, “mostly” obtained from the notorious antiquities dealer Douglas Latchford. PHOTO: EDENBRIDGE ASIA/THE PHNOM PENH POST
Besides The Met, what other museums are holding Cambodian artefacts?
There are about 100 museums around the world that have Cambodian artefacts, and we’re in touch with many of them. For example, we’re in conversation with the Smithsonian Institute in Washington, DC. They have been very transparent and open, sharing their provenance information with us. The Smithsonian have said that if we want anything back, we should just make a request and they will take it seriously and consider it. The Smithsonian, as a US government backed museum, has been supportive and respectful of Cambodia.
We are also in dialogue with other museums in California, also in the UK where our team is working closely with our advisor Melina Antoniadis and a few more in Australia – and the conversations are positive. In due time, we will shift our attention and make progress toward those locations as well. The MET, unfortunately, is one of the more difficult cases. But in the future, I believe more museums will recognise that if they hold stolen artefacts, especially those associated with dealers like Latchford, and if these artefacts arrived during periods of war or genocide, they would want to do the right thing. They may want to keep the artefacts, but if we request them, they’ll return them.
This is incredibly important for Cambodia because each artefact that comes home helps us learn more about Cambodia’s history. To be clear, Cambodia doesn’t want to empty out the museums. We’re open to reviewing collections and saying, ‘OK, several of these don’t need to be returned’, or that certain statues can remain on loan in those museums.
For the artefacts not returned, we want it to be clear that they’re owned by Cambodia, and we can accept having them being displayed on loan in the museums. So, we’re not trying to get everything home and all at once; however, we want Cambodia to be in full control of its cultural heritage. There are many important artefacts that were taken during times of war and even earlier. We’re also looking at pieces taken during colonial times, like those in the Guimet Museum in Paris.
For the Cambodian people today, the returns are extremely important. The Met, on the other hand, has shown great disrespect. To bar a lawyer from a meeting with the Cambodian delegation – what are they afraid of?