"I've been very clear about this: I don't think they should go back to Greece," Culture Minister Michele Donelan told the BBC about the thorny issue at the heart of tensions between London and Athens. .

For decades, Greece has been asking for the return of a 75-meter frieze detached from the Parthenon as well as one of the famous caryatids from the Erechtheion, a small ancient temple also on the rock of the Acropolis, both key pieces of the British Museum.

London claims the sculptures were "legally acquired" in 1802 by British diplomat Lord Elgin who sold them to the British Museum.

But Greece maintains that they were the object of "looting" while the country was under Ottoman occupation.

The restitution of the Parthenon friezes is a highly sensitive subject in Greece.

In the Acropolis Museum, a space left empty is reserved for this frieze.

The friezes of the Parthenon at the British Museum in London on January 9, 2023 © Daniel LEAL / AFP

On January 4, the British newspaper The Telegraph awakened the hopes of the Greeks by revealing that the president of the British Museum George Osborne was in the process of concluding an agreement with Athens for the return to Greece of these treasures, within the framework of a long-term loan, a "cultural exchange" which would make it possible to circumvent a British law preventing the London museum from dismantling its collection.

A statue from Easter Island

The words of the Minister of Culture on Wednesday therefore represent a cold shower.

"We shouldn't send them back, and in fact they belong to the UK, where we took care of them for a long time," she said.

The president of the British Museum George Osborne "is not going to send them back. It is not his intention. He has no desire to do so", swept the minister.

She seems to dismiss the long-term loan that had been mentioned: "It's certainly not what he plans either".

In the News Agents podcast, the minister said the idea of ​​100-year loans was "not at all in the spirit of the legislation".

On Monday, a spokesman for the Greek government admitted that negotiations with the British Museum were "not easy".

"We have come a long way, we have taken steps (forward) and the efforts continue," he said.

"The objective is the definitive return" of the friezes, insisted this spokesperson, because Greece "recognizes neither the possession nor the ownership (of these works) by the British Museum".

Detail of the Parthenon friezes at the British Museum in London on January 9, 2023 © Daniel LEAL / AFP

Pressure has increased in recent years, in the wake of movements against racism, for Western museums to return works, particularly obtained during the colonial period, to their country of origin.

The British minister also said she feared that a return of the Parthenon friezes would open "Pandora's box".

"It's a very slippery slope," she said.

In August, a museum in Glasgow, Scotland handed over to India seven works of art looted from sacred places during colonization in the 19th century, in a first for a cultural institution in the UK.

On the other hand, inhabitants of Easter Island in the Pacific continue to claim from the British Museum the return of the moai Hoa Hakananai'a, a monolith 2.4 meters high and weighing four tons.

It had been removed from the island without authorization in 1868 by the navigator Richard Powill who had offered it to Queen Victoria.

© 2023 AFP