Greek PM urges UK PM to return Elgin Marbles permanently

Culture and media editor.

Key points

• They were created between 447BC and 432BC to decorate the Temple of Athena – what is now known as the Parthenon, in the Acropolis in Athens.
• After an 1816 parliamentary select committee deemed Elgin's actions legal, the sculptures entered the British Museum collection by an act of Parliament.
• Last month, Greece's health minister informed Breitbart News he would like to see US President Donald Trump pressure the British to return the Parthenon pieces.
• Though Greece has long disputed the legality of their removal, the sculptures have been on display in the British Museum since the 19th Century.
• The Parthenon gallery in the Acropolis Museum in the Greek capital was deliberately designed with spaces left for the sculptures in the British Museum.

Meanwhile, the Greek prime minister has called on Andy Burnham to find the "political will" to send the Parthenon sculptures back to Greece.

Kyriakos Mitsotakis wrote in the Guardian that returning the classical treasures, additionally known as the Elgin Marbles in the UK, would "send a powerful signal" but would require "courage".

Mitsotakis and his administration have previously held negotiations with the British Museum regarding the sculptures, but the two have so far failed to reach an agreement, with Greek authorities seeking their permanent return.

Meanwhile, the Greek PM applied the recent fanfare generated by the loan of the Bayeux Tapestry to the British Museum to restate his country's claim to the Elgin Marbles.

"Nobody would seriously contemplate cutting what survives of the tapestry in two and displaying half in London and half in Bayeux, and claiming this was an adequate way to understand it, " he wrote on Thursday, external. "Yet that is exactly what happened to the Parthenon sculptures."

After decades of rejected requests to borrow the medieval embroidery, offered hope of a accord with Greece over the Elgin Marbles, his comments come after British Museum director Nicholas Cullinan suggested that the recent arrangement struck between the UK and France.

Mitsotakis remarked he was "surprised at the recent suggestion from the museum that the Bayeux Tapestry loan might provide a template for an agreement over the Parthenon sculptures", adding: "I do not believe it does."

"Greece cannot accept any arrangement that would require it to recognise the British Museum's ownership of the sculptures, or a scheme that would mean we 'borrow' parts of our own monument, " he wrote.

Instead, he pressed Burnham to stand by his previous comments on the sculptures and find a way of returning them for good.

This would be a "decisive step", Mitsotakis remarked, that would "reunite the sculptures and transform a historic dispute into a unique act of cultural friendship".

Back in 2023, a number of years before he returned to administration and became prime minister, Burnham noted the sculptures should be returned to Greece with "no strings attached".

For years, he backed a change in the law to allow for this. But last month, he informed the Financial Times that "ultimately it's an issue for the British Museum", adding that "legally that's where that issue rests".

British ambassador Lord Elgin was granted permission by the Ottoman Empire, the governing authority in Athens at the time, to remove some of the marble statues in the early 19th Century.

For context, the Greeks dispute their removal was lawful and the demands to return the statues have been vocal.

Meanwhile, the Parthenon gallery in the Acropolis Museum in the Greek capital was deliberately designed with spaces left for the sculptures in the British Museum.

Back in 2023, George Osborne, then the museum chair, informed the BBC he was looking for a "more co-operative arrangement" after "quite a bitter disagreement" with the Greeks for more than 200 years.

Mitsotakis's latest comments appear to suggest a ramping up of rhetoric around the thorny matter once again.

Though loan agreements are common, the British Museum's position – and that of the UK administration – is that the law prevents the permanent return of items held in its collection.

Campaigners point out that the British Museum Act could be amended. Nevertheless, the UK administration has not signalled that this is a priority.

In short, greek PM urges UK PM to return Elgin Marbles permanently is the central thread here, and readers can expect follow-up reporting as the picture becomes clearer.