Geoffrey Robertson (who has previously dealt with high profile cases such as fighting extradition of Wikileaks founder Julian Assange), along with Amal Alamuddin (who may be better known to many as the new Mrs George Clooney) are amongst lawyers, who have been asked to meet with the Greek Prime Minister Antonis Samaras to discuss the issue of the Parthenon sculptures.

It is not yet known what form these discussions might take, or what approach they might be inviting the Greek government to take.

Amal’s involvement with the Parthenon Marbles follows the statements made by her now husband, George Clooney at the premiere of the film Monuments Men earlier this year.

Amal Alamuddin & Geoffrey Robertson

From:
Sydney Morning Herald

Amal Alamuddin and Geoffrey Robertson team up to win back Elgin Marbles for Greece
Nick Miller, Europe Correspondent
October 9, 2014 – 11:13AM

London: The new “Mrs Clooney” has her first post-wedding job – and it’s a doozy.

In tandem with fellow human rights barrister Geoffrey Robertson, Amal Alamuddin is taking sides in one of the most controversial cultural arguments of recent history: she will try to win the return of the Elgin Marbles to Greece.
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More coverage of the (rejected) requests for the Hunterian Museum’s skeleton of Charles Byrne to be buried at sea.

From:
Sydney Morning Herald

UK museum to keep ‘giant’ skeleton
Tim Moynihan
December 23, 2011
PAA

British museum chiefs have rejected a suggestion by experts in law and medical ethics that the skeleton of an 18th-century man known as the “Irish Giant” should be removed from display and buried at sea.

Charles Byrne, originally from County Londonderry, stood just over 7ft 7in tall.
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Australian soldiers removed a mosaic dating from AD 561 from a ruined church near Gaza in 1917. Many questions continue to be raised about whether Australia should return this artefact, that they still have in their possession.

From:
Sydney Morning Herald

Questions raised over ‘looted’ mosaic
Andrew Taylor
August 14, 2011

IN 1917, a Byzantine mosaic created during the reign of Emperor Justinian was removed by Australian troops from the ruins of a church near Gaza. The Australians knew they were plundering the priceless antiquity during World War I, two authors now claim.

In a new book, authors Paul Daley, a Sun-Herald columnist, and Michael Bowers, raise questions about Australia’s continued possession of the mosaic, which has been in the Australian War Memorial collection since 1941.
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Few who have visited the New Acropolis Museum in Athens can deny the powerful argument that it represents for the reunification of the Parthenon Sculptures. The British Museum’s response however is to continue ignoring the issue & pretending it will go away, claiming that the opening of the new museum does not change anything.

From:
Sydney Morning Herald

A new life for ancient history
August 30, 2009

The New Acropolis Museum in Athens brings together Greece’s greatest treasures, writes David Whitley.

If ever something was on a hiding to nothing, it’s the New Acropolis Museum in Athens. It cost €130 million ($222 million) to build, is designed to hold many of Greece’s most important national treasures and is already being promoted as a tourism flagship.
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With only days before the New Acropolis Museum opens, two former Australian Prime Ministers have reiterated their long-standing support for the reunification of the Elgin Marbles to Athens.

From:
Sydney Morning Herald

Old political foes call for return of lost marbles
Anthony Stavrinos
June 14, 2009

FORMER prime ministers Gough Whitlam and Malcolm Fraser have united behind fresh efforts urging Britain to return the Parthenon sculptures to Greece.

They are co-patrons of Australians For The Return Of The Parthenon Marbles (ARPM), which renewed its call for the artefacts’ return as Greece prepares to officially open the Acropolis Museum.
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Whilst there have been many successes in the campaigns for restitution of Aboriginal Australian artefacts, in some cases, there is less willingness to return pieces to their original owners.

From:
Sydney Morning Herald

UK council meets Aborigines over remains
May 16, 2009

Aboriginal leaders have met with British authorities to demand the return of a rare skull.

Brighton and Hove City Council previously ignored an agreement between the Australian and British governments and refused to return the skull because of its rarity.
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More coverage of the most recent agreement by a British institution to return Aboriginal remains from its collection.

From:
BBC News

Page last updated at 13:56 GMT, Wednesday, 13 May 2009 14:56 UK
Museum returns Aboriginal remains

Members of an Aboriginal tribe held a ritual in front of Liverpool’s World Museum to mark the repatriation of human remains to Australia.

A skull is being returned to representatives of the Ngarrindjeri people because it has strong spiritual and religious significance.
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The opening of the New Acropolis Museum next month will represent a mojor step forward in the campaign for the reunification of all surviving fragments of the Parthenon Sculptures in Athens.

From:
Sydney Morning Herald

Greece steps up demands for return of Elgin Marbles for new museum
* May 12, 2009

ATHENS: Greece is making new demands for the return of the Elgin Marbles to coincide with the opening next month of the £115 million ($230 million) Acropolis Museum, which has a reserved space for the famous piece of classical statuary.

The museum has been established as a home for the 146-metre-long frieze that adorned the Parthenon until 1801.
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More coverage on the decision by Brighton’s Booth Museum of Natural History against returning an Aboriginal artefact that involves human remains. It is important to recall, that whilst the Human Tissue Act allows Museums to return artefacts involving human remains where they would otherwise not be allowed to, there is nothing in the act that says they have to return such pieces. On the other hand, in most cases, artefacts have eventually been returned, so any institution that is not doing so is making a concious decision to go against what has become the currently accepted practise.

From:
Sydney Morning Herald

UK museum wants to keep Aboriginal relic
February 11, 2009 – 2:29PM

A rare Aboriginal relic is expected to stay in an English museum despite fears it could spark an Australian backlash.

Brighton and Hove City Council plans to keep a water carrier made from a human skull that has been stored in a museum in Brighton, a coastal city south of London, since 1925.
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Yet another return of human remains from a UK museum to an Australian aboriginal community. A sign that where there is a will to do so, Museums & other institutions are able to see the requirement to return artefacts to their original owners.

From:
Sydney Morning Herald

UK to return more Aboriginal remains
January 7, 2009 – 6:52PM

Another set of Aboriginal remains held at a British museum for almost a century are to be returned to Australia.

Two skulls and two thigh bones kept by the Booth Museum of Natural History, in Brighton, East Sussex, are expected to be repatriated within days.
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Further coverage of the return of the Palermo fragment from the Parthenon Sculptures. The move to repatriate the piece ties in with the opening of the Nostoi exhibition in the New Acropolis Museum, displaying looted artefacts that Italy has recovered in recent years.

It is also worth mentioning that two more fragments (both currently in the Vatican) are also expected to return to Athens shortly.

From:
Sydney Morning Herald

Italy returns long lost Parthenon fragment to Greece
September 24, 2008 – 2:05AM

Italy has returned to Greece the ‘Palermo fragment’, a marble piece of the Athens Parthenon missing for nearly 200 years, officials said Tuesday.

The sculpted fragment of the ancient Greek hunt goddess Artemis, part of the eastern Parthenon frieze depicting the twelve gods of Olympus, had been in the collection of the Antonio Salinas Archaeological Museum of Palermo.
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Normally one hears about cases of artefacts whose original context has been destroyed after the event rather than before. In this case though, a campaign is underway to protect Aboriginal rock carvings in Western Australia.

From:
Sydney Morning Herald

Garrett urged to protect cave art from extraction
Marian Wilkinson, Environment Editor
September 13, 2008

A CAMPAIGN to win World Heritage listing for the Aboriginal rock carvings on the Burrup Peninsula in Western Australia threatens to push the Rudd Government into a confrontation with the energy giant Woodside Petroleum.

The Environment Minister, Peter Garrett, is coming under pressure from archaeologists, led by the head of the International Federation of Rock Art Organisations, Robert Bednarik, to nominate the site. It is believed to hold the largest concentration of rock art in the world and is possibly the first site of human habitation in Australia.
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