Egyptian artefacts return home

Bead necklace Cairo - Arabstoday After two years with Brussels Airport Customs Police, a collection of 80 artefacts that were stolen from Egypt and illegally smuggled out of the country is to arrive to Cairo today. The story started in April 2010 when Customs at Brussels Airport caught an Egyptian woman trying to smuggle 80 genuine objects concealed inside two large replica Egyptian statues. The objects were confiscated by the Belgian police while Brussels National Museum verified their authenticity. According to routine, the museum referred the case to a Brussels court and Egypt succeeded in obtaining a court order that the artefasts be retrieved. Osama El-Nahhas, director of the returned antiquities section at the Ministry of State for Antiquities (MSA), said that the objects include 11 small wooden and limestone statuettes, 11 amulets and 27 scarabs from the ancient Egyptian era; Islamic cylindrical seals; a Coptic child's robe and a small decorated piece of textile; a lion-shaped Ptolemaic pot and a prehistoric clay pot.